The garage bands went on the road with varied goals. Some of them were playing to pick up a few hundred dollars to help get through school. Some played to pay their bar bills. Others had their sights set a little higher and dreamed of a recording session in Muscle Shoals or Nashville. Playing in a band could make an important contribution to a high school student’s budget; a wad of bills for a few hours of fun seemed like a big deal at the time. Bandleaders were in constant negotiation with venue owners for increases in pay or beer. The meeting of band and venue owner usually went as follows, as related by Dale Aston of the Torquays: “A tubby middle-aged man greeted us and gave us the standard band greeting: no drinking on stage — no girls in the room — no smoking on stage — don’t play too loud, etc., etc.” But all the rules were there to be broken and the party that started on the bandstand often ended up in the sensuous confines of a motel room. Playing rock ’n’ roll in Alabama was not without its peculiar dangers, especially where booze and girls were involved. And booze and girls were usually involved. Vodka and underage girls ruined one trip that the Distortions took to Demopolis. The gig at the party went well —“Man, we had a ball!”— and the band’s celebration in the motel after the party went even better until the police arrived. Disaster! The story ended with the band spending the night in jail for underage drinking. The next morning the judge, who had earlier been at the party, fined the band all the money they had made at the gig.4
The thrills of the road went hand in hand with the maturation of the garage bands as musicians. Playing for money, and learning how to entertain a crowd, pushed amateurs to a level of professionalism. There was always that moment of epiphany when you realized that the band was really playing together and you had finally made it. It might come at the end of a set when the crowd cheered or when a promoter asked you what you were doing for the rest of the summer. Some bands enjoyed a special moment of triumph. Dale Aston remembers when the Torquays played Panama City: “Our first night to perform at the Old Dutch was fun. We had a chance to meet our fellow performers, Mark Dinning [known for his songs on Teen Time in Birmingham] and the exotic dancer, White Storm. We began an upbeat instrumental and brought her onstage to raucous applause from around seventy-five well-lit people ready for the show. Remember, she was only a few feet in front of us on the stage as she danced about … All of a sudden White Fury turned her back to the audience, faced the band, and tore her top off, revealing two bounding breasts with tasseled pasties at the end. The drummer lost a stick, and the band lost it for a moment before recovering. I don’t think the audience even noticed the sour chord. After the first night the strip act became routine for us and we hardly noticed when the clothes came off. I guess we had finally become true professional musicians.”
The college fraternity circuit was easily the best place for a garage band to play, but it only operated during the school year, during football season in the fall and coming to a climax with graduation in the spring. The long, dreary months of summer tended to drag on with little musical entertainment and employment opportunities for amateur musicians. Driving down to Panama City, Florida, for the summer vacation became popular in the 1950s as this sleepy seaside town developed into a major tourist destination for folks from Alabama and Georgia. By 1960 it was welcoming a million visitors a year, and the “Miracle Strip” became an icon of southern culture that also supported a lot of live music. It became a summertime tradition to go down Panama City Beach. The route which went along the two-lane highways to Florida became an indelible part of the memories of summer for many in Birmingham. In the 1940s and 1950s the annual trip to Panama City was a family affair, with several generations crammed into an automobile heading for a wooden cottage a few steps from the beach.
J. D. Weeks’s love affair with Panama City began in 1949. “I knew the routine. Take Highway 31 out of Birmingham, turn right on Highway 331 in Montgomery and go as far as you could, which was Highway 98 in Florida, and turn left.” Some years later he would hitchhike with some of his fraternity brothers: “We were picked up about 2 a.m. by an already full car that included Dinky Harris another Viking fraternity brother. We did finally arrive and got right out near the Hang Out. After a lot of searching we found a lady that would let us sleep on the floor of her living room. Her cottages were all full and she felt sorry for us.” Bad Betty: “Boy, back in the 1950s Panama City Beach was the New York of all high school kids. On Fridays we would load up and take off, heading to the beach. All the guys were wound up and would stay wound up the whole time they were there. Running along the beach, trying to make out with the girls, drinking a beer, going to the Hang Out and just having a blast. The sororities were all there trying to outdo each other. Dixie Debs were always around and flirting with everyone’s guys … The music was great, laughing and talking and meeting new folks. Sitting on the beach listening to the music.”5
Music and dancing were central to the Panama City vacation. You listened to it on the radio as you drove down. Sarah Bradford Wear: “Seems we kept it on Duke Rumore until we got close to Montgomery, then the dial on the radio would get a workout … looking for our finger-snapping, hand-clapping, and singalong favorites until we could get our luggage to the motel door.” The Newspaper Boy: “We listened to WSGN for as long as we could, switching to WVOK and its 50,000 watts until it signed off at sunset … We went through all of the small towns and tried hard to find a radio station playing good music. South of Montgomery we picked up a Tennessee station with a black deejay playing ‘So Tough’ by the Original Casuals.” And when you got there, rock music was everywhere: from live bands at the Old Hickory restaurant and the Old Dutch Tavern, and from numerous jukeboxes at the popular Hang Out or at Aultman’s or at Little Birmingham, a liquor store and gift shop: “The music was great, laughing and talking and meeting new folks. Sitting on the beach and listening to the music.” But most important, the music was there to dance to, and the place to dance or just be seen was the Hang Out, a large, open pavilion right on the beach, with music blasting from several jukeboxes. Here you did the Bop or just watched from behind the wooden railing that enclosed the concrete dance floor. Don Campbell: “The Hang Out was the place to see and be seen on the beach, usually all night and all of the day. Some didn’t have to get out of bed; they slept on the beach. The dancing started early at the Hang Out, with the jukebox playing the newest 45s continuously [six plays for twenty-five cents]. The music had to be loud to drown out the scratching of the sand between the dancer’s shoes and the dance floor … The guys would spot who the best dancers were and who looked best in a bathing suit or a pair of white short-shorts with a golden tan. Many of the girls danced with a set of large curlers in their hair so they would look good that night.” The Newspaper Boy: “The records on the Hang Out jukeboxes included songs we would always associate with PC [Panama City] and the Hang Out: ‘Hully Gully’ by the Olympics, ‘You’re So Fine’ by the Falcons were great 1959 dance songs, and ‘Searchin’/Youngblood’ by the Coasters, ‘Honky Tonk’ by Bill Doggett, ‘The Stroll’ by the Diamonds, and ‘That’ll Be the Day” by Buddy Holly and the Crickets. We didn’t spend much time on the beach because the music from the Hang Out drew us to it. The Hang Out was a concrete-floored open-air pavilion with a high gabled roof and a wooden railing around it with four jukeboxes.” Henry Lovoy: “I was ten years old when I learned to Panama City bop, which was the dance. If you knew how to bop you could dance with the older women [sixteen and older] … I went to the Hang Out every night and bopped to the great rock ’n’ roll music … At the Hang Out, at eleven o’clock, the big cop [Tom] would lock up the jukebox. Then we would go to a little place to dance called Aultman’s, but then for only an hour, since it was late by then.” Sarah Bradford Wear: “Of course we’d have to comb our hair again for the umpteenth time, freshen our drugstore lipstick and … carry our shoes to the concrete dance floor at