Bandstand Beat

Bandstand Bits: Old myths die hard, and Dick Clark created one of the toughest

One of the biggest obstacles a writer faces when tackling a subject as well-known as American Bandstand is getting things right. A person might think that in the 63 years since Bob Horn's Bandstand first hit the air on WFIL-TV, there has been ample time for basic facts about the show to bubble up, be verified and accurately entered into the show's historical record.

Unfortunately, that's not how things work. It's kind of like having 10 witnesses to a bank robbery. Those 10 witnesses will have 10 unique stories. There will be similarities, but there will be just as many differences. Sorting it out can be quite a chore.

With American Bandstand, I want to offer just one simple example. For 40 years, Dick Clark controlled the conversation about American Bandstand. He wrote all the Bandstand books, gave all the Bandstand interviews and, for most of those years, he hosted the show. Over those 40 years, he consistently claimed that he integrated the show from the beginning of its network run. He wasn't any hero, he'd say, with great humility. It was just the right thing to do.

But it wasn't true. As John Jackson pointed out in his 1997 book, American Bandstand: Dick Clark and the Making of a Rock 'n' Roll Empire, and Matthew F. Delmont expanded on in his 2012 book, The Nicest Kids In Town, American Bandstand systematically kept black teenagers off the show for its entire Philadelphia run.

Even with Jackson and Delmont's excellent work in correcting the historical record, the discredited Clark-propagated myth that he brought black kids into the WFIL-TV studios out of some lofty moral conviction persists today.

In 2009, former Bandstand regular Bunny Gibson was knocking on doors of houses around the old WFIL-TV studios when she stumbled on a black couple whose home allowed them to watch the parade of teens and singers in and out of the studio in Bandstand's glory days. Struck by the irony of a black couple literally on the outside looking in on a show they couldn't attend, Gibson alerted Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Annette John-Hall, who wrote a nice piece about the couple.

Three weeks later, Lew Klein (who was executive producer of American Bandstand during its Philadelphia years) wrote a letter to the Inquirer stating that the assertion in John-Hall's article that African-Americans were not allowed to dance on the show was "absolutely not true." As evidence, he cited a passage from Clark's book, Rock, Roll & Remember, from 1976.

Three days after printing Klein's letter, the Inquirer ran a correction to John-Hall's column, saying she "erred in stating when African Americans were permitted to dance on camera [on American Bandstand]." The Inquirer further stated: "Dick Clark recruited black dancers when he took over as host in 1957."

It's disappointing that a Bandstand insider such as Klein would rush to Clark's defense, especially since it was Clark's own creative mythology that was "absolutely not true."According to the unpublished manuscript for a book, Bandstand off My Back, long-time Bandstand producer Tony Mammarella details the methods WFIL-TV officials used to enforce their "whites only" policy. Mammarella lists those station executives who endorsed the policy; Lew Klein is on that list.

As a former newspaperman, I find the Inquirer's rush to judgment especially troubling. Its eagerness to throw its own reporter under the bus on the basis of misinformation that basic fact-checking would have easily proven false is a betrayal of fundamental journalistic principles.

As I said at the start, getting things right can be a tough proposition. And, sometimes, being right is just not good enough.

Author Larry Lehmer's book about Dick Clark and American Bandstand --  Bandstandland: How Dancing Teenagers Took Over America and Dick Clark Took Over Rock & Roll --is available from Sunbury Press. Go here to learn the story behind the writing of Bandstandland or here to listen to the Pennsylvania Cable Network's interview with author Larry Lehmer.

Larry Lehmer's book about the last tour of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens -- The Day the Music Died -- is available at Amazon.

 

Bandstand Bits: Some reviewers were harsh, but Bandstand fans stuck with show

American Bandstand, while highly rated and beloved among teens and young adult women, didn't have universal appeal. Disdain for the show was widespread among older generations that had grown up in the big band or crooner eras and had little use for rock & roll.

Thus, it was not unusual to see Bandstand and other Dick Clark musical programs panned in the media, which was in control of the generation most likely to dislike rock & roll.

Clark was a favorite target of United Press TV writer Rick DuBrow who once described American Bandstand as “the Dick Clark dance show monstrosity for the squirm set.”

Time magazine was considerable more gracious as it explored the American Bandstand phenomenon on April 14, 1958, pointing out that Clark stood to make a half million dollars that year and that ABC had mailed out some 300,000 photographs of the Bandstand host since its debut a few months earlier. The Time article pointed out that teens have hitch-hiked from as far away as Texas to be on the show “and one Buffalo family did not notice a son was missing until he rock ‘n’ rolled onto the screen.”

Clark's Saturday Night Show from New York also came in for criticism. When more than 500 kids showed up for the 300 seats available for the premiere show in February 1958, the disruptions drew complaints from other theater owners down the street.

Broadcasting magazine's review of that show reflected the generational divide: “Rock and roll and oysters have one thing in common: the effect of sheer delight or outright nausea. There is little middle ground. Accordingly, an evaluation of The Dick Clark Show hinges on individual taste.”

From the Regulars. "Bobby Hughes gave a party for Janet Hamill. She really flipped over the festivities and had the time of her life dancing the evening away with Jimmy Peatross. Naturally, Kenny and Arlene showed up together and didn't separate the entire evening. Rumors that these two are on the outs are just - well, rumors." - Bandstand Newsletter from Barbara Levick, 16 magazine.

Author Larry Lehmer's book about Dick Clark and American Bandstand --  Bandstandland: How Dancing Teenagers Took Over America and Dick Clark Took Over Rock & Roll --is available from Sunbury Press. Go here to learn the story behind the writing of Bandstandland or here to listen to the Pennsylvania Cable Network's interview with author Larry Lehmer.

Larry Lehmer's book about the last tour of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens -- The Day the Music Died -- is available at Amazon.

 

 

 

Bandstand Bits: Here a quote, there a quote, everywhere a quote ... and "The Bug"

“The Twist was a guided missile, launched from the ghetto into the very heart of suburbia.”

That provocative quote about the world-wide sensation that was launched by Dick Clark on American Bandstand came from the book Soul On Ice by Eldridge Cleaver. As you might expect from a program that ran on national television for more than 30 years, American Bandstand (and Dick Clark) generated many interesting quotes. Here are a few:

From Connie DeNave, who put many of the young singers who appeared on American Bandstand through "charm school": “The young people who were recording in those days had to be well-groomed and well-dressed, because the press thought that rock ‘n’ roll was the lowest form of life, and that the people who sang it had just crawled out from under a rock." (From Like Young: Jazz, Pop, Youth and Middle Age by Francis Davis):

From Stephen Kahn, who began pitching stories about Dick Clark to teen magazines while still a student at the Bronx High School of Science in 1957: “I must have written between 75 and 100 articles on Dick Clark. You might say I'm his Boswell.” (From New York Times, Sept. 16, 1964, by Joan Cook)

From Chuck Barris, who was assigned the task of keeping an eye on Dick Clark during the payola probe in 1959-60:  "Every day at American Bandstand for want of something better to do, I would write a memo to myself concerning the trivia of that afternoon: who was on the show, who canceled, what songs the performers sang, if their performances were good or bad, some meritorious though highly fictitious feats I had accomplished, a few jokes, one or two philosophical contemplations. When I wasn’t doing that, I was introducing myself to the various artists, chatting with them as though I knew what I was talking about.

“I shook Brenda Lee’s hand and told her she had a great future in the business, She thanked me and walked away. I had no idea she already had nine gold records." (From Barris’ book, The Game Show King).

And, a personal favorite, from one-time American Bandstand regular Mary Anne Cuff: “What it is we all want is to get married and live on the same street in new houses. We’ll call it Bandstand Ave.” (Washington Post, Sept. 27, 1999, Henry Allen):

Finally...many dances came and went in the Bandstand era. For every successful one like the stroll or the Twist, there were dozens that never made it on air, most for very good reasons. Here's one that popped up briefly in Miami and, for whatever reason, failed to spark a national dance fever:

  

Author Larry Lehmer's book about Dick Clark and American Bandstand --  Bandstandland: How Dancing Teenagers Took Over America and Dick Clark Took Over Rock & Roll --is available from Sunbury Press. Go here to learn the story behind the writing of Bandstandland or here to listen to the Pennsylvania Cable Network's interview with author Larry Lehmer.

Larry Lehmer's book about the last tour of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens -- The Day the Music Died -- is available at Amazon.