Leon High School
Tallahassee, Florida
Class of 1959
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April 1956 Headlines
(courtesy of http://dmarie.com/timecap/)
Apr 2 - Soap operas "As the World Turns" & "Edge of Night" premiere
Apr 3 - German war criminals Hinrichsen/Rhl/Siebens/ Viebahn freed
Apr 7 - Spain relinquishes her protectorate in Morocco
Apr 8 - 20th Golf Masters Champ: Jack Burke Jr wins, shooting a 289
Apr 8 - 6 marine recruits drown during exercise at Paradise Is SC
Apr 10 - Philips broadcasts 1st Dutch color TV programs
Apr 11 - French govt decides to sends 200,000 reservists to Algeria
Apr 11 - Nat Cole attacked on stage of Birmingham theater by whites
Apr 14 - Ampex Corp demonstrates 1st commercial videotape recorder
Apr 17 - USSR's Cominform (Parliament) dissolves
Apr 17 - Willie Mosconi sinks 150 consecutive balls in billiard tournament Apr 18 - Egypt & Israel agree to a cease fire
Apr 19 - 60th Boston Marathon won by Antti Viskari of Finland in 2:14:14 Apr 19 - US actress Grace Kelly marries Monaco's Prince Rainier III
Apr 21 - Elvis Presley's 1st hit record, "Heartbreak Hotel," becomes #1
Apr 22 - Patty Berg wins LPGA Dallas Golf Open
Apr 23 - US Supreme court ends race segregation on buses
Apr 27 - Heavyweight champ, Rocky Marciano, retires undefeated
Apr 28 - Last French troops leave Vietnam
Apr 28 - Reds Frank Robinson hits his 1st of 586 HRs
Apr 29 - Betsy Rawls wins LPGA Peach Blossom Golf Open
COUNTDOWN TO GRADUATION - APRIL 1956
Well, that's it for this month. See you again next month ... when I turn 65! Wow! Now that's old!
As usual, PLEASE - if you have any walks down memory lane that you'd like to share, particularly in the May 1956 time frame, by all means email them to me! I really enjoy having something in here written by someone other than me!
OOPS! WAIT! Almost forgot ... as I mentioned last month, in keeping track of what our "elders" are doing for their 50th reunions (Class of '56, '57, '58), I stole a copy of the plans from Leon56.com for their reunion this weekend and put a copy over on our 50th Ideas page. Check it out! I think they have some great ideas there! I especially like the breakfast at Leon on Sunday. If you haven't taken the web poll on that page, do it to give us your preferences.
Personal Memories of April 1956
I don't know about you, but the biggest event on the headlines list above, in my humble opinion, was Heartbreak Hotel hitting #1 in the top ten hits list. And why is my 1951 Studebaker Champion up there with Elvis? Because I vividly recall being in my Studebaker up on Chowkeebin Nene, throwing newspapers, when I first heard Heartbreak Hotel on my radio. It might not have been until May, since I didn't turn 15 until May 1956 (so couldn't hardly have been driving alone), but I recall that being my first real exposure to Rock and Roll music. I was mesmerized! Loved it then and still do! And do you remember the flip side of H. Hotel? --- It was I Was The One. I didn't remember that - got it out of the Wikipedia entry on H. Hotel - click Elvis to read more. Click either Studebaker photo for a closeup of that magnificent automobile. Served me well, despite my continual mistreatment. Notice the "customizing" - done by my older brother, Dick. Hood and trunk ornaments seldom lasted long around him and his trusty fiberglass. And very few went without fender skirts and fancy chrome hubcaps.
I was trying to recall how I got away with driving alone when I was only 15. I recall we got our "learner permits" at 14, but I was thinking we had to have a licensed driver in the front seat. Was that only when 14 and we could drive alone in daytime at 15? Who knows .. maybe I just broke the law alot.
Top 10 Hits of April 1956
(First week of the month)
(courtesy of
US Top Ten (first week of the month):
1. Poor People Of Paris - Les Baxter
2. Lisbon Antigua - Nelson Riddle
3. Rock And Roll Waltz - Kay Starr
4. No, Not Much - Four Lads
5. Hot Diggety/Juke Box Baby - Perry Como
6. I’ll Be Home/Tutti Frutti - Pat Boone
7. Blue Suede Shoes - Carl Perkins
8. Why Do Fools Fall In Love - Frankie Lymon & The Teenagers
9. Heartbreak Hotel/I Was The One - Elvis Presley
10. The Great Pretender - Platters
US R&B chart toppers this month:
Drown In My Own Tears - Ray Charles
Long Tall Sally - Little Richard
US Country chart toppers this month:
Blue Suede Shoes - Carl Perkins
While on the topic of Hoffman autos, I thought I'd include a couple of photos of my mother's 1956 Ford convertible. I notice that, in these photos, the V on the hood is already gone, spinner hubcaps are on, scoops at the tail end of the side chrome, different taillights, vertical bars gone from the grill - looks like Dick already worked it over and I don't think he did that until she passed it along to him in 1957 (I think). Click either one for larger views. I believe Dick was going through his Crosley phase about this time. However, I was scanning the Studebaker photos from my old photo album, so decided to do the Ford at the same time. And you know the most amazing thing about all this? ... that I still have that old photo album! How many things do you still have from 50 years ago? For some reason, I've carried this album along through travels across the USA several times, through my time in the Air Force, through 3 marriages, and into my retirement. What a packrat, eh?
By the way, if you want a bunch more detail on headlines, go visit that http://www.rocknroll.freeserve.co.uk/april.htm location.
And do you recognize that background in the photos above? Looks to me like Ft. Myers park - not sure why we took the photos there, but that's what it looks like to me. And, guess what else is in my photo album? Pictures of the time they drained the lake at the bottom of the hill on Hokolin Nene - what lake, you say? Yes, there was once a lake there. Does anyone remember when? Does anyone care? ... LOL. I've got a photo of John Hankin, standing in the middle of the lakebed holding a fish. Must call John one of these days - he's one of those who hasn't signed up on the website yet. And he supposedly lives in Ft. Pierce, about an hour South of me. Shame on me, eh? In fact, I was in Ft. Pierce about a week ago, getting some work done on my RV ... oh, well. Can't do it all. I'll call him before the 50th comes along.
Looking through that Top Ten hit list above, I notice we've finally got some decent Rock 'n Roll songs on there. If you'll look back over the last few months, you'll see some Bill Haley stuff and a few like the Rock Island Line and the Rock and Roll Waltz that sort of qualify, but songs like Heartbreak Hotel, Blue Suede Shoes, and Long Tall Sally were the real thing! They launched Elvis and Little Richard on the road to fame and fortune, and launched us and a bunch of other teenagers on a lifetime of electric guitars, gyrating singers, and parental concern that Rock and Roll was going to ruin us all!
I just read the Wikipedia entry on Blue Suede Shoes. Did you know that Johnny Cash first suggested the idea to Carl Perkins, based upon an experience he'd had in the Air Force? And that Perkins was on his way to New York in 1956 to appear on Ed Sullivan and the Perry Como Show, when he had a car accident? That little twist of fate, plus Elvis doing the song a few months later, probably gave much of Carl's future to Elvis. Click the news article on the left for more details.
Much of what I find each month when I do a month-year search is stuff on Ebay. Above are two Ebay items. I didn't even think we had a TV Guide back then, but there you have it. The top left four are from April - covers with Nanette Fabray, Dorothy Collins, Dinah Shore, and Phil Silvers. The Life Magazine issue for April 1956 obviously talked about the problem of teenagers on the phone. Remember those party lines and our parents constantly telling us to limit our calls, get off the phone, don't stay on so long, etc.? Although some families got separate lines for the kids, I think most of us just got by the best we could, sharing the line with the rest of our family and often with several of our neighbors. I heard of a guy recently who supposedly has the last party line in the USA. Story goes that he's the only one on the line and that he pays $5 a month for the service -- and that they have to continue providing him with it until he decides to change his service. True or False? Who knows ... just another interesting tale. Click either photo above to check out other April 1956 Ebay items.
In April 1956, if we spent an hour a day on the phone, we were "tying up the line." Today, teenagers with cellphones probably spend more like 10 hours a day. Do you think they get any more said than we did? .... haha ... probably not. I remember that my brother Dick and Steve Greene, who lived up the road from us, were dating the same girl ... AND, we shared a party line. Seems they both spent a lot of time listening in on each others' calls, cutting in, and generally vying for the telephone time - at the same time that both our parents were telling us to spend less time on the phone. Ah! Those were the days!
1956 Prices
Bread: $0.18/loaf
Milk: $0.97/gal
Eggs: $0.81/doz
Car: $2,100
Gas: $0.30/gal
House: $17,800
Stamp: $0.03/ea
Avg Income: $5,341/yr
Min Wage: $1.00/hr
DOW Avg: 499
US President
Dwight D. Eisenhower
US Vice President
Richard M. Nixon
Academy Award Winners
Best Picture: Around The World In 80 Days
Best Actor: Yul Brenner in The King And I
Best Actress: Ingrid Bergman in Anastasia
Here's another biggie of the month - Prince Rainier and Grace Kelly. Click the photo to see a video of wedding photos. That was certainly the start of a famous family. Children Caroline, Albert, and Stephanie, the car crash that killed Grace in 1982 ... Did you know that Prince Rainier only died a year ago, in April 2005? I thought he was gone long ago.
Although I only remember Grace Kelly in Rear Window, Wikipedia says she was in at least 8 movies, including High Noon, Mogambo, three Hitchcock films, and that she got an Academy Award for her role in Country Girl. Guess I wasn't paying attention to those types on things in 1956.
