The summer of ’65 – Episode 11 of an ongoing series
By Bill Kelly
Ninth Street and Central Avenue was like Times Square and the Chatterbox was Grand Central station in downtown Ocean City when Petula Clark’s “Downtown” song was a hit on the charts in the summer of ’65.
There was a take-out only hot dog and ice cream stand on the Southwest corner, the Galley Sub shop across the street, the Greek joint popular with the hippies and the Chatterbox, which was Ground Zero of the teenage social scene.
The Chatterbox soda fountain and grill had been there for some thirty years and had a storied history even then, still run by the same family and was pretty much the same in ’65 as it was when it opened in the 1930’s. Before they remodeled it – around 1969, the “Box” had a big stainless steel and formica soda fountain that ran along the west wall, similar but bigger than the one at Ready’s Coffee shop on 8th street that’s still there.
There was a juke box, a dime a song, three for a quarter, and maroon and white vinyl seats and formica booths against the other walls, booths that were moved to the Varsity Inn – College Grill when it relocated from the 14th Street boardwalk to 8th Street at the same time they renovated the Chatterbox.
The Chatterbox, where both of the mayor’s daughters worked, was famous for its celebrity alumni, as a number of former employees went on to fame and fortune, most notably Grace Kelly – Princess Grace of Monaco. Then there was popular TV commentator Chris Mathews, and Pittsburgh history professor Donald Goldstein, bestselling author of Pearl Harbor books including “At Dawn We Slept.” Both Goldstein in the fifties, and Mathews, in the sixties, flipped burgers on the Chatterbox grill when they were still in college, with Mathews also worked at Watsons restaurant and nights as a singing waiter at Your Father’s Mustache bar in Somers Point.
Even after she became a famous movie star and then a princess, Grace Kelly always came back to Ocean City every Labor Day weekend to be with her family. While she was in town she would bring her kids to the Chatterbox for lunch and an ice cream float, play the juke box and fraternize with the waitresses like she was just another shoebee.
This year however, word on Ninth Street was that Grace Kelly’s husband, his royal highness Prince of Monaco, would be accompanying her, and bring all of the international rigmarole that came with him. It would not be a normal Labor Day with the Prince in town and the Barbarian Bikers on the way.
In the Summer of ’65 most of the high school and college kids who worked as waiters, waitresses, short order cooks, pizza makers and retail clerks either lived with their parents, in a group rental, or in one of the cheap hotel rooms at the Biscayne, the Strand on the corner with its large wraparound porch, or the Lincoln, next door to the Chatterbox.
The five story wood clapboard Lincoln Hotel was pretty quiet most of the year, its conference room a comfortable and secluded enough for the members of the private, members-only Riverboat Club to meet at noon for lunch each weekday.
While Ocean City was technically and officially a “dry town,” its blue laws, written by the Lake Brothers, made the sale of liquor illegal, but there were some loopholes, private clubs like the VFW, American Legion, Elks, – there was even a black Elks club on the West Side. And then there was the Riverboat Club, a loose confederation of local Ocean City businessmen who enjoyed having a drink with their lunch. So they met every weekday afternoon at noon and had food catered over from the Chatterbox or Watsons, and ordered a shipment of beer, wine and booze that was delivered in a white, unmakred van from DiOrio’s Circle Cafe in Somers Point. Three trips daily, one in the morning, one at noon and another at six, with the Lincoln Hotel being the first stop.
There wasn’t a problem most of the year, but after late May, when the college kids hit town, they occupied all of the 2nd floor rooms around the Riverboat’s conference room, drank beer by the case and kegs on weekends, and blocked the halls with their bicycles, surfboards and skateboards. On the whole, they provided a stark contrast to the straight, suit and tie businessmen of the Riverboat Club.
The College Kids formed their own clique and called themselves the “River Rats” to mock the RiverBoaters, but they all tried to get along. Both camps enjoyed drinking however, and the college kids were surprised but happy to learn from the Riverboaters that they didn’t have to drive over the causeway to the Point to buy more beer, but could just pick up the phone and call Joe at DiOrios and get on the shipment list for one of the three deliveries of the day.
Eventually the Riverboat Clubers would get tired of the College Kids and their silly antics and move into more permanent quarters in the big old rooming house on the southwest corner of 8th and Wesley Ave.
But in the summer of ’65 the Riverboat Club was still meeting at the Lincoln Hotel, and putting up with the college kids. The ranks of the Riverboat Club included the Mayor, Bob Harbough of Bob’s Grill, Roger Monroe the bookstore owner and Michael Rozet, who owned a hip cheese shop – Le Grand Formage (which means the Big Cheese) that was wedged between the Chatterbox and the Lincoln Hotel. Rozet was friends, and later business partners with Bill Hamilton, an Ocean City high school teacher who also owned the Rock Box record shop on Asbury Avenue, and coached soccer and taught a summer school literature class.
Harry Anglemeyer was a member of the Riverboat Club, until he was murdered, and the other members of the club tried to keep up with the latest developments in the case, but after awhile, they stopped talking about it.
On this particular mid-week afternoon in late summer 1965, as the Riverboat Club met for lunch at the conference room of the Lincoln Hotel, most of the Chatterbox waitresses piled into a couple of cars to go to the Seaview Country Club on the mainland for a surprise 18th birthday party for the eldest of the mayor’s daughters. The mayor had learned, from Elwood Kirkman, that John B. Kelly had a special Sweet Sixteen birthday party for his daughter Grace in the Rainbow Room at the Seaview so he arranged for a similar party for his daughter Kate, a move he would come to regret.
Kirkman was Georgetown College roomates with H. “Hap” Farley, who had taken over the Atlantic City rackets when Nucky Johnson went to prison. Farley’s right hand man was Sonny Fraser, the State Senator who introduced the resolution to bring legal gambling at the Atlantic City Race Track, that was built and co-owned by John B. Kelly, the bricklayer who won an Olympic gold medal in rowing and built most of the skyscrapers in Philadelphia. The other owners of the track included Sonny Fraser’s friends Bob Hope, Bing Crosb and other Hollywood celebrities who wanted a piece of the action. And John B. Kelly’s daughter Grace was spoiled with a birthday party at the Seaview and wanted the same kind of party for his daughter.
The exact circumstances are a bit blurry today, but from what can be pieced together from those who were there, a dozen or so teenage girls had lunch in the Rainbow Room, ate a cake, played some popular 45 rpm records on a little square record player and were dancing among themselves when they heard, from a busboy cleaning the tables, that the Rolling Stones were guests at the hotel. In fact, it was Mick Jagger’s birthday too! And at that very moment Keith Richards was throwing a birthday party for Mick downstairs in the basement Game Room right next to the Rainbow Room.
Katie was led downstairs by the bus boy, and introduced herself to Mick and told him it was her birthday too, and asked him if he would come up and meet the girls at her party upstairs.
When Duncan, who drove some of the girls to the party in his 65 Mustang convertible, sat at the lobby bar near the Rainbow Room sipping a long neck Bud, he saw the giggling girls standing around Mick Jagger.
“Is that Mick Jagger?” he asked the bartender.
“Yes, sir it is,” came the reply, “they’re playing Steel Pier.” Duncan rolled his eyes and ordered a rare shot of Scotch whiskey.
It later came out – you couldn’t keep such a thing secret, it later came out that Mick invited the girls downstairs to his party, and so as not to cause suspicion, one by one the girls meandered down the steps to the game room where they played pinball, shot pool, drank beer and smoked pot with the Rolling Stones.
The mayor’s daughters thought that was the greatest thing after the Bay Shores rainy day matinee, and knew they were going to be grounded for the rest of the summer, but were quite surprised at their father’s reaction. They were in the other room and could hear him talking with Mister Kirkman at his Flander’s Penthouse, yelling at Kirkman – “How could you let my daughters, and the daughters of my best friends drink and smoke pot with the Rolling Stones!?”
They couldn’t hear Kirkman’s excuse or what he said, but in the end, in no uncertain terms, could either of them leave the house on Labor Day weekend, they were grounded. The party they had planned was off, and they couldn’t leave the house. And they knew why. It wasn’t because they partied with the Rolling Stones, it was because the Barbarian Bikers were coming, and the mayor didn’t want them out on the streets when the bikers were raping young girls and pillaging the town.
Next Up Episode 12 – Conway Returns and the Second Coming of Tido Mambo
To comment on this series – Billkelly3@gmail.com
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