Music Drove His Story

 
 

Kenny Hubbard at Homecoming at Pittsfield High School 

Kenneth Loren Hubbard was a farm boy in a small community who had talent and who was loved.  Kenny was tremendously talented, and by age 17, he and his band had traveled with great success. This a some of his story, a little long, but it gives a mental photo of his life. 

Sorry about the length of this biography. A man's life should not be a short story.


The following is taken from a group FaceBook site "Pike County...."

When I called Kenny about telling his story a few years ago he was very happy about the idea. He had wanted to tell his story for awhile but was concerned people would think he was showing off. I told him this is your story and you should tell it. I also told him by telling his incredible story it was not showing off and that many people were wanting to hear his story. I visited him several times and Kenny even sang a few songs. He still had a great voice. I enjoyed going to another place and time with Kenny... he was a wonderful, interesting, very nice man..

Kenny did big club shows as well as radio. He did shows with big names like Jerry Lee Lewis, Ray Price, Ferlin Husky, Brenda Lee, Fats Domino, Sonny James, Little Richard, Dion, Bill Haley and the Comets, and Roy Orbison. He played in Michigan, Oklahoma, Ohio, Tennessee, Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, Pennsylvania and Texas.

He played the J Michael's Show a few times and the St Louis Hop three times. He also played at the opening of the Quincy Mall in the late 1950s.
Kenny said he met Fabian and Frankie Valli on the third floor of a recording studio in Philadelphia. An agent told him to look out the window and pointed at two young guys who were washing a 1954 Chevy. Fabian and Frankie came up to meet him. He said they were very nice and liked his song.

He described Fats Domino as a super nice guy. He played a show with him in either Iowa or Oklahoma, he could not remember which. Kenny said when he was on the road he didn't know where he was most of the time.. he said "I just went out and did the show."

After about a year, Kenny's mother Norma wanted him off the road,, she felt he was too young for that kind of life. At the time he was about ready to sign a contract with Imperial Records and move to Los Angeles. He said he was not happy but did leave the road and enlisted in the Navy. Later he understood why his Mother no longer wanted him on the road.

Kenny said his manager was stealing from him.. money, clothes, anything related to Kenny that could make his manager money. His record that did not go nationwide in the US did very well in Europe although Kenny wasn't aware of this until later years. His manager knew and pocketed the profits.

He said he had a great time the year or so he was on the road but he was young, just 17. Kenny said he seen and learned a lot adding more than a 17 year old kid should.

Kenny also loved to reminisce about his local band mates before and after his days of being road.

Kenny will be so missed.. my thoughts and prayers to his family and friends. May his Fan Club continue..

And now?


Kenny died 2020, at the age 78. He was born on Dec. 25, 1941, just as War was beginning. I knew him when I was about 5 yrs old, when he gave me a ride to his mother's house for a Sunday School party. I had a crush on him after that.

After leaving the road, Kenny was a "frogman" during the Bay of Pigs, when Cuba was supposed to be freed from Castro. I was in Norma Hubbard's house when Kenny called her to let her know he was safe after this adventure. We stood by her as she talked with him; the phone was a old wall hung phone. The town's phone operator Barbara had patched his call onto Norma Hubbard. 

 

Kenny Hubbard and Ed Franklin on the way to boot camp.

 

 

The Intruders

W.Words: Yellowstone Blows Up

 

Jerry had packed a suitcase weeks ago, checked off days on his Hot Babes calendar, and read everything possible about Yellowstone National Park.  This had been his lifelong dream, so much so that he had saved intensely for fifteen years. I can scarcely believe it...Yellowstone! Yellowstone, at last!

Jerry sprinted to catch his Bus, tripped over a case left on the sidewalk by a curvy blonde and fell hard on his knee.  Even though his scrape bled like a son of a gun, Jerry stopped to put his packed suitcase into the belly of the beast.  The case popped open, spraying his clothing onto dripping oil by the bus.  Hot Babes was forever disfigured.

Finally ol' Gray rattled out onto freeway from Burton, Florida, heading straight to Yellowstone.  In 30 minutes or so, ol' Gray wheezed to a stop, and all could see the radiator boiling ,sending steam straight up.

Jerry felt his colon cramp and his stomach become a knotty mass of anxiety.

When ol' Gray returned to bus station, Jerry was nearly crying.  While there had never been any sort of competition between calendar to calendar, Jerry had kept years of Hot Babes calendars, crossing off days after days.  This was the month...the month...


                                                   Extent of possible eruption affects

While this is a blurry map, it does show the extent when the caldera blows.  Bad news for all.

  Ironically, the next day it was announced that the immense caldera beneath Yellowstone Park blew, exploded, blasting apart all states from Canada to Texas, Nevada to Illinois, over to Oregon and down the western coast, and all parts in between. Clouds of ash covered the skies around the world.

It was a royal mess.

Jerry's head hung down despondently.  Gone, it was gone.  As he tacked his new Hot Babes calendar, Jerry pondered where he would go instead.  Iceland?  Iceland would be nice...He crossed off another day, heading toward Iceland in a decade or so.

Oh, Jerry, poor uninformed Jerry.

Stupid tourists with falling boulders from YouTube

The above italicized underlined words are a gift from Wednesday Words back in 2014, which were provided by Elephant's Child.

 

Each week during one month, volunteer bloggers provide a writing challenge by posting 6, 12 words and/or a sentence/photo prompt.  This gives writers a jolt to experience winding those words into a cohesive poem, prose, short-story, whatever genre.

Participants may post their take on these words in comment section, or indicate that your post will be at your site.  This helps readers to find you, which is nice.

Where is...?

After what has seemed like months, I have unpacked my ever-rotating suitcase.  Laundry is folded and put away.  My blog is starting to appear in my brain and ideas gently unfolding. 

There are problems.  They all start with “Where is/are….?”

My toothbrush and whitening tartar reducing toothpaste?  Can’t find them.

Aquage™ shampoo and contioner?  Dang—those things are expensive!

Those trinkets and gifts for our family?  WHERE did I put them?

The list is much longer and more pathetic.  No reason to embarrass myself.

Basically, it all reduces to the simple facts:  Either they are lost, or I will find them the next time we travel.

Source: mzacha

On Being Humble

source

Trips that end with sitting in a crowded, hot, and noisy airport terminal make me cranky.  The trip had begun with carefully packed suitcases, full with enthusiasm.  The end of the trip is always the opposite.

source

No one was happy at the departure gate.  Delays in boarding, children crying—we all know the temperaments flying around in such a place.  But the atmosphere on the day I flew home from seeing my baby grandson in Europe switched abruptly.  

Silence, yes, silence lay over us all as we watched the airline officials escort a group of twenty foreigners onto the plane, ahead of those first class passengers. 

Foreigners.  Heck we were all ‘foreigners’ in Europe, tourists to the bone.  But these people were truly from another country.

They walked with quiet dignity through the gangway.  Tall, elegant, regal.  We could only guess that they were from some African nation from their clothing and black skin.  We watched them disappear into the plane.

That was when people woke up, started questioning what they had seen.  The mixture of their voices and tones was like gravel pouring onto a metal plate.

Someone in the movie industry once related how crowds of extras were directed to sound and say in any scene that involved an angry mob.  They were supposed to say “Rhubarb” in different tones and speeds.  That would produce the mob sound without involving any dialogue.

“Rhubarb” sounds erupted all over the gate 34, until the general boarding began. 

I discovered that my seat was next to one of these foreigners, and quite honestly I didn’t know what to say to him.  He and I were stiffly still in our narrow seats, avoiding eye contact, touching on the armrest.  ‘Who are you?’

Nine-plus hours of non-stop flights are torturous when sitting in the cheap seats.  Sleep became impossible when the four toddlers a few rows up began tag-team wailing.  Screaming. 

Just as I started to nod off, a woman’s voice jarred me awake.  I looked over to the foreign woman as she explained to her group what the custom cards were.  That was when I truly looked at the man sitting next to me.

Not a man, but a boy, about fourteen.  He was tall, with long elegant fingers, arms and legs.  He was strikingly handsome and strikingly gaunt.  He made eye contact with me, and we both smiled.  His eyes were yellow tinged and blood shot.

As the plane began its descent, he tried to ask me where I was going, in barely understandable English.  He proudly announced that he was going to Caleefornee to live with his father.

The Photographer

The foreigners remained on the plane until the rest had exited.  As I waited in line to pass through customs, I observed this boy and his group being escorted to a private room to be processed.  They were refugees being relocated with family in America. 

The Photographer

The Photographer

Later, I saw his suitcase and boxes at the baggage claims.  Barely held together with rope and duct tape, they had his name and destination:  Oakland, California. 

A lesson in being humble rolled over me, and I could only look down at my feet.