Putting two and two together I've concluded that the record is my uncle's, who spent some time (about ten years) working out in Tulsa. I remember him arriving back at Glasgow airport with a pile of stuff for us - American football jackets, Indian headdresses, etc. I must have been about 8 years old, so that would have been nearly 16 years ago.

From what I gather the band are a covers band, playing in local pubs, etc? I'm guessing my uncle probably saw them sometime. It'd be interesting to know a bit more about them.

Paul K (nephew of John Ross)

The good thing is that a new team called the Shreveport Sports (an old nickname dating from the 1950's) is now playing at the same stadium the Captains played. They are in the Central Baseball League which is a short season league with mostly younger players from small local colleges, though some minor league cast-offs and some players with some pro experience are on some lineups. The team is coached by former Pro manager Terry Bevington, and while they don't have much experience, they play with good old school fundamentals and the enthusiasm that pro players have forgotten about.

I checked out a game a couple weeks ago, only $4.99 for general admission plus it was a friday night and cold draw beer was $1.50 in a big cup - lets see the Rangers and Astros beat those prices!

Billy

http://www.shreveportbaseballclub.com/

I"ve been away from Shreveport for nearly twenty years and I don't follow sports as closely as I used to, but:

The team the Texas Rangers moved to Frisco, Texas, was known at sale-time as the Shreveport Swamp Dragons (of all names!). The team was formerly known as the Shreveport Captains, not Generals

The Captains got that name because Captain Henry Miller Shreve ran a snagboat up the Red River early in the 19th century surveying the possibilities of navigation. He did stop at what is now Shreveport, but he went on into Texas. There are many stories (and several books) about navigstion in East Texas and on the Red River--when that was still practical, as far west as Jefferson, I think.

I KNEW my long stay in Shreveport would pay off some day!

His father originally designed it and operated it as a restaurant, but that went belly up after a few years, and if I remember the article correctly, it has been several different things, including a Burger Joint, residence, antique (Second-Hand? Junque?) shop, and a couple of other things. The ownership remained in the family for several decades, however.

The couple that now own it bought it from either the architect or the estate of the architect, and remodeled it.

I had been in it a couple of times over the last several years, and it is to say the least, an interesting building, and actually goes back into the hill several feet.

No relation, but right in the same area, on top of the hill just east of Knobblock Park, there is a house that was a bootlegger's residence for a number of years during the "dry" days of Oklahoma's history, that has a tunnel that goes either to the street or the back of the lot that allowed for quick loading and unloading, as well as a quick pick-up of the desired adult beverage by those who were a little dry. Bad pun, Bad pun.

Mike Miller is right. Old Oiler Park was at 15th and Sandusky, west of where the Driller Stadium is today. About the only thing that is left from the old stadium is a pine tree that somehow made it through the years. Sources: Wayne McCombs' "Baseball in Tulsa" and my sore, hot feet from pacing the parking lot.

The first time I went up in the Pressbox, or Pigeon Coop, in old Oiler Park to make sure the phone company got the lines in the right place for the games that the station I worked for was going to air, I kind of had my doubts about how secure the stadium, and the press box was, but Terry Greene assured me that it had been there for years, and wasn't going to fall down unless it was blown down. (Remember the one phone company days? One call sets up the circuits for the games.)

But it was a windy Spring day, and the phone guy beat a pretty hasty retreat, and this was a guy that was used to climbing poles.

By the way, if you haven't picked up a copy of McComb's book, and you like Tulsa history and sports in general, it's worth the money.

Halfway through the season, the budget ran out, so we put Terry Greene in the control room, and I sat in the production room with the SFX records and a few other things we contrived.

A quick,real quick because of the cost, long distance call at the end of the innings would give Terry the stats, and we were on our way to producing what was probably one of the last "fantasy" baseball games heard on Tulsa radio.

At least, I hope so.

Re a PTL "Urban Legend" - my former NC employer - MediaComm in Charlotte is the successor or descendent of PTL. I worked for a for-profit subsidiary that did motorsports contracts for Fox.

A former PTL employee - now retired - told us that her dissatisfaction with PTL began when muckedy-mucks at PTL started having "lower management" personnel come in and start "liberating" cash contributions "for other missions". All checks were deposited in PTL's regular accounts. In PTL's heyday - they had 5 letter opening machines. But no - the folks there did not wear coveralls. They were minimum wage workers but trusted as "Christians" and had to meet a litmus test to be allowed to be around incoming contributions.

Do ya'all remember the infamous Robert Tilton mail scandal in Tulsey several years ago? Didn't KOTV break that one nationally?

Bruce also poked fun at Oral Roberts. Bruce (as Oral) was admitting how dumb he was. “I’ve got two Lincoln Continentals, that’s how god damn dumb I am.” I think that album was titled: “The Sick Humor of Lenny Bruce.”

Anyway I used to play what few Lenny Bruce cuts I could on KWGS when I was at TU. Bruce was featured along with Mort Sahl, Shelley Berman and a few other avant-garde comics who had recorded some of their humor on LPs in the 50s.

At the groundbreaking of the University, I interviewed Roberts and asked if he had ever listened to Lenny Bruce’s ”Religions, Inc.” Oral paused for a moment and told me he had not.

Hey, it was probably only a little white lie.

Warning, this is deep memory purge, so it may be entirely wrong.

Thought the Diamond Towers was where the envelopes for Oral were opened. Since most contained contributions, and many contained cash, the windowless building was part of security.

I also heard that employees who opened the envelopes were forced to wear smocks that were pocketless and that there was a hi-tech (then) system that vacuumed the cash into the vaults within seconds of the envelopes being opened, but all that may be aprocryphal.

The Rangers ended their affiliation agreement with Tulsa to bring the team to Frisco (much closer to DFW).

Tulsa wanted to be the new AA affiliate for the St. Louis Cardinals (which would have been a BIG move for the Drillers), but no agreement could be reached. So, they had no choice but to sign on with the Colorado Rockies.

Although there has been no nickname or logo change to this point, I would suspect that the red white and blue Drillers logo will soon adopt their parent club's black purple and gray colors.

When I was in Florida a few years ago for spring training, I attended a Royals/Pirates game at McKechnie Field in Bradenton. It looks just like every one of these brand new retro parks, the only thing is, it's been there for like 70 years. It's worth seeing.

Regarding Oral's old building downtown, I can see that building from my office, and pass by it every morning. It certainly looks like it needs some work. I've seen old photos of it, and it used to have a large spire of some sort on top of it.

To the best of my knowledge, no part of the fairgrounds was directly hit by a tornado on 6/8/74. Of course, with the amount of severe weather in the Tulsa area that day, there could have been some damage there. The first tornado struck on the west side of the river, just north of I-44, striking the Warehouse Market. It more or less hopscotched through town, with next major damage being reported near 21st and Sheridan. The second tornado was across south Tulsa and Broken Arrow, moving across a portion of the ORU campus.

Drillers Stadium...certainly a fine facility for what it is, but hardly the best in the minors. Maybe one of the best in AA ball. For the best, just head down the 'pike to OKC. Another fine minor leage facility, Victory Field in Indy was built in the 90's, and was one of the first stadiums, major or minor league, to be built in the retro style.

The best thing Drillers Stadium ever did was rip up that horrid astroturf and install grass.

I was there for that first season in the new park and I defy anyone to identify any remaining structure of the original Sutton Stadium today. Drillers Stadium is a marvelous facility. We don't need fancy iron work or bricks, that place is a masterpiece. Finest park in the minors hands down.

I remember the old Oiler Park light standards stood for many years after the park was demolished. When did those finally come down?

I remember when a student at TU had a full scholarship at ORU. After the first year, he left and transferred to TU even though he had no such scholarship at TU. It just wasn't worth it, he said.

Go rent one of her DVD's or VHS movies. "The Lion In Winter" and almost anything she did with Spencer Tracy are my favorites

I also remember slaughter in the ORU Art Dept. when they had life studies/figure drawings. It outraged Oral I guess and he fired several of the art profs. TU got about 20 art students as transferees...

Lastly I remember when ORU started making grads have to pass a body fat test. The intentions I guess were good but KTUL employees still attending ORU as undergrads, dreaded not making their body fat rate as determined by ORU's Phys. Ed. Dept.

Perhaps our bad weather guru can shed more light on this, but is it true that the original grandstand was hit by the 6/8/74 storm? I know they used to race cars where Fair Meadows is now, but did they not race in what is now the parking lot?

http://www.davidhortonministries.org/building.html

http://www.honda.co.uk/multimedia/index.html

The one named 'The Cog' is the one to watch. I heard this took over 400 takes to get right.

The Exposition was a great way for high school kids to pick up some extra money in a short time, because the pay was far better than one could get at the typical after-school job. Too bad that it was such a short run. I could have retired earlier.

Which reminds me. Note Mike Bruchas: Please empty your mail box. My emails come back undelivered.

National Do Not Call website to stop telemarketers from pestering ya'all is www.donotcall.gov or ya'all can call 1-888-382-1222. You folks West of the Mississippi get serviced first and NO you can't register anyone but your home phones.

Don't you hate them siding salesmen calls when surfing TTM?

He was extremely popular, both on and off mike. During the program Doc would often refer to his day job, which was working in a funeral home, which he called the “Body Shop.” Doc did dialogs with a character called “Terry the Termite,” which was Doc’s voice speeded up and recorded earlier. The show was sponsored by Tulsa Camera-Record. He would have some munchies with him each night that he always claimed to have been purchased at “Aunt Bertha’s Sweet Tooth, Cheerful Kitchen.”

Doc later moved over to KRMG to do the evening shift. Few people probably realized it, but Doc was also a Justice of the Peace. One day he took me to his house, where he proudly showed me his office where he held forth as JP.

I got to know Doc well. I first met him when, as a Central high senior, we did “Sleepwalkers’” on KVOO Day (or, if you worked at KVOO, it was Central Day.) He was very helpful and fun to work with. When I went to KRMG, driving the Newsmobile, Doc’s early evening shift overlapped with mine. He was always friendly, cooperative, and a delight to work with. When I would have something to report on the Newsmobile, I would call in to Doc, notifying him of the need to make an insertion into his music show. It was never any problem. He frequently would begin his introduction to me by singing the name of the song, “Where is our wandering boy tonight?”

I have two recordings of Doc, one of which I cannot find at this moment. That one is a phone report of a tornado that hit Durant. Doc interviewed a friend who was living there. The recording I do have is a brief appearance in 1951 of our “Sleepwalkers’ Serenade” show that we did on KVOO Day.

Doc Hull was such a likable person. I never heard anyone say a negative word about him.

...and wow, Starbase 21 pulled out all the stops this year getting celebs, didn't they? At Expo '89 we had George Takei and John deLancie, and a bunch of blooper reels...

Years ago I had a couple of bandmates who claimed to have been at a Yardbirds show at what was then, or later became, the Stables Lounge. I scoffed at the time, but then who knows, this is Tulsa we're talking about after all.

Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck on the same stage. The mind reels...

It was built before the Continental, and I think it is older than Tulsa's University Club Tower.

I've only been in the building on a couple of occasions, both times to eat at the Eagle's Nest; a rotating restaurant atop the tower.

On a better note, I will be attending the Fleetwood Mac concert Tuesday night in OKC. Wee!

Comment on the OKC Continental photos...

If memory serves, the theater was converted into a dance club sometime in the 1980's. I think I remember a shooting there at some point during that time. It's in what is still a nice area of town.

The tall building you see in the background of some of the photos is the United Founders Tower. Funny story about that, I was stuck in an elevator in that building somewhere around the 22nd floor during a tornadic storm in the late 80's. If you think hearing a tornado siren at any time is scary, imagine hearing it while hanging 20+ floors up by yourself with nowhere to go!

The tower (photo #17 in the series in the previous Guestbook) looks like OKC's version of the University Club Tower (or vice versa).

I'll be there.

He and his wife, Mary Jo, have indeed moved back to T-town from L.A.

Trek Expo starts Friday the 27th, headlined by William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy on Saturday at 2 pm, the Batmobile all 3 days.

How do you pronounce "Nimoy"? Last weekend when things got slow around the workplace, the whiff of a high-handed "corrective" air about one person's ni-moy' pronunciation sent an easily-resolved quibble spiraling into an epistemological black hole, revolving around the unreliability of the memory of one's own past verbal behavior...just what a boss wants to see: philosophy inaction.

Anyway, more about the event here: