12/12/12

   This is a monumental day!
   It is the twelfth day or the twelfth month
of the twelfth year!
   It's not only the last of the alliteration dates
 for about 100 years.
   It is "National My Ding-A-Ling Day!"
   According to the web site Holiday Insights
it's a day you "should brace yourself for bizarre
and crazy behavior, from all of the people you
encounter. Even normally conservative people
have been known to go a little crazy on this day."
    The title brings to mind one of the most
memorable Christmas parties I ever attended
when I and my radio partner went a little
crazy!
     It was 1972. In addition to being the News
Director of WILK I wrote a daily comedy skit
about a nutty inventor I called "Mr. Chemistry."
    My buddy Bill Dennis acted the part of the
accident prone professor  while I provided the
voice of his inquisitive next door neighbor kid
Bobby.
    That same year Chuck Berry released the
popular novelty record "My Ding-A-Ling."
    The song tells of how the singer received a toy
consisting of "silver bells hanging on a string" from
his grandmother, who calls them his "ding-a-ling."
    You didn't hear it much on WILK (which
was a Top 40 music station back then.)  One of
our owners, Leon Schwartz, ordered it
pulled from the air as being "objectionable."
     That year, at the Christmas Party, Bill,
dressed as Mr Chemistry, and I, dressed as
Bobby, unveiled the professor's newest
invention. It was an Automatic Gift Selector
Machine!
     When Mr. Schwartz's name was fed into our
apparatus it produced a gold copy of Berry's
recording! With our hearts in our throats we
presented it to our boss!
      Fortunately for us,  though he hated the song,
he loved the joke!
      Isn't Christmas Spirit wonderful!?
     Coincidentally it was our last Christmas at
 the station. We both left for "greener pastures"
by 1973.
     But one of my favorite "Ghosts of Christmas
 Past" will always feature a little gold record by
Chuck Berry, a DJ in a Lab coat, and a usually
dignified newscaster in short pants and a Beanie
hat with a propeller on top!
     Regrettably I don't have a photo of the affair.
You'll just have to use your imagination!
      Hope you've got some great Christmas
memories, and that all your NEWS is good!