All posts by Craig Hodgkins

E-Tickets Enjoyed a Great Ride

60+May+E

As Disneyland Resort gears up to celebrate the June 15th Grand Reopening of Disney California Adventure Park (featuring the highly anticipated Cars Land), let’s pause to honor an important part of the Resort’s history with ties to the same date. This item owed its existence to an earlier Park remodel, enjoyed a twenty-three year lifespan and spawned a phrase still in some use today. It was once so vital that you truly couldn’t enjoy Disneyland Park without it. I’m talking about the “E” ticket, which ended its amazing ride as the official ticket media of Disneyland nearly 30 years ago, on June 15th, 1982. Ticket books (or “coupon” books, as they were officially known) were first issued a few months after Disneyland opened in July 1955 in denominations “A,” “B” and “C,” with the “D” ticket joining the booklet a year later. Walt promised that Disneyland would never be completed…

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5 Reasons to Become a Ghost

Blank Books

A ghost WRITER, that is. I was a corporate speechwriter in a past work life, so writing books for others was a smooth and logical transition for me. Why? I’d become adept at writing in voices besides my own. But even if you haven’t written speeches or scripts, you can do it. All you need is skill, a collaborative spirit, an open mind, and a good ear. Oh…and an assignment. Need more encouragement? Here are five good reasons to become a ghost:

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Remembering Walt: A Labor of Love

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It was your typical California summer day in the late ’50s. Dick May was taking tickets in front of the Casey Junior Circus Train in Fantasyland when a woman at the front of the line asked, “Does Mr. Disney ever come around here? Before May could respond, a smiling man with a mustache and a wide-brimmed hat spoke up from behind her. “Yes,” said Walt Disney to the speechless woman, “I do.” Walt may have surprised the woman in line, but to May and his Disneyland co-workers during the Park’s early years, Walt’s presence was a regular—and often unpredictable—occurrence. In fact, he would often appear and be gone as soon as he learned what he wanted. “I was testing the Skyway one morning soon after the installation of the new cabins” May recalls. “I was watching them come in when Walt appeared and asked how they compared to the old…

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Happy Birthday, Phil Silvers: From Burlesque and Blinky to Bilko and Beyond

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I always looked forward to the dances that followed our high school football and basketball games (we didn’t dance after baseball). Win or lose, we’d shower and suit up in our best late 70s party attire (mostly because it was the late 70s), then make our way back to the gym to check out our potential partners. But the dances weren’t my favorite thing to do late at night. Like many in attendance, I always had big plans for AFTER the dance. But where some might have schemed to sneak away for some light drinking or heavy petting, my reason was always the same, Monday through Friday. I had to get home to watch Bilko. In those pre-DVR (or even VCR) days, there was no other way to scratch a Phil Silvers itch. I had to be in front of the family set by 11:00 pm, tuned to Oakland’s KTVU….

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100 Years of Louis Prima: An Appreciation

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To one generation of fans, he was the “Wildest” show in Vegas and Tahoe. To another, he was the voice of “King Louis the Most.” To Sam Butera and the Witnesses, he was known simply as “The Chief.” Louis Prima was born one hundred years ago today—December 7, 1910—in the Little Palermo section of New Orleans’ French Quarter. It’s fitting that he came into the world surrounded by a tossed salad of nationalities (his neighborhood was home to Italians, Jews, Middle Easterners and African-Americans), because the music he made throughout his remarkable career was embraced by fans the world over. For more than five decades, Louis Prima played it pretty for the people, and the people loved him for it. Originally a violinist, Prima switched instruments following the early success of his older brother Leon, who played trumpet with Jack Teagarden’s orchestra and several others. The switch to brass made…

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Books: Frank Fenton and “A Place in the Sun”

A Place in the Sun

It’s really all Joseph Henry Jackson’s fault. In June of 2002, I picked up Jackson’s Continent’s End: A Collection of California Writing (1944). As a collector of western lit — specifically on my native California — I regularly thumb through anthologies which expose me to writers unknown to me. And Jackson, a long-time critic and book reviewer for the San Francisco Chronicle, didn’t disappoint. Alongside authors I’d already read and collected (the hugely underrated George R. Stewart as well as Fante, Steinbeck, Corle, Saroyan and Schulberg), were excerpts from Hans Otto Storm’s “Count Ten,” Royce Brier’s “Reach for the Moon” and Idwal Jones’ “China Boy.” The excerpt I enjoyed most, however, was a chapter from Frank Fenton’s “A Place in the Sun.” I’d never heard of it, or Fenton. The only “Place in the Sun” I knew was the unrelated film of the same title (adapted from Theodore Drieser’s “An…

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Bud Dashiell’s Solo LPs, Part 3: “I Think It’s Gonna Rain Today”

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Part 3 of “Bud Dashiell’s Solo LPs.” For Part 1, click HERE. The landscape of popular music changed dramatically during the final two years that Bud & Travis were back together. Even the year they chose to reunite was pivotal. In 1963, folk music went prime time with the launch of ABC-TV’s Hootenanny! show, but it was also the year that the mighty Weavers — one of the most influential of all folk groups — finally called it quits. Of course, Bud & Travis had never referred to themselves solely as “folk singers.” Travis had even gently protested that classification at their heralded 1960 live concert in Santa Monica: “One of the things that is frequently said of Bud and myself is that we’re folksingers…I guess if we sing, and we’re folk…it fits. But we like to do anything that we like. We don’t like to…just stay on one kind…

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The ’68 Nixon: A Political Primer From Denver, Boise & Johnson

With national politics in the air once again (whether or not you like what’s “blowin’ in the wind” is up to you), it seems more than appropriate to revisit a tiny portion of the 1968 presidential campaign, specifically this musical ditty from Denver, Boise & Johnson, a group which evolved from The Chad Mitchell Trio. This cut (subtitled This Year’s Model) and Take Me To Tomorrow (the flip side of the Reprise 45) are the only known commercial recordings of DB&J. The stereo track below is taken from an early 70s Warner Bros. “Loss-Leader” 2-LP set titled Hard Goods. (CLICK the arrow to listen) The CMT had a history of mixing humor and political satire into their tight vocal harmonies (starting with the classic The John Birch Society), and the tradition continued through a series of personnel changes. In 1964, they became The Mitchell Trio (to become more egalitarian), and…

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Remembrance Rocks

Rememberence Rocks

Think of a story that has been passed down through generations of your family. Read Joshua 1-4 Some stories recall triumph and victory. Others evoke hardship, brokenness and pain, and leave us wondering “if only, if only…” But all stories have at least one thing in common: they take us to a place in time – sometimes to a time before our own – to experience a moment, learn a lesson, or examine a decision. God uses stories to teach us His truth. Joshua knew all the stories. He was God’s handpicked successor to Moses. He’d stood beside his mentor to celebrate the triumphs over Pharaoh, and mourned the willful disobedience of the people. Because of his faithfulness, he was chosen to lead the new generation into the Promised Land. Just as significantly, he was instructed to tell the stories – stories he had witnessed and heard – so that…

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When Someone Else Says It

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In the charming and underrated Hearts of the West (1975), veteran motion picture actor and scribe Howard Pike (Andy Griffith) lays it on the line to tenderfoot writer Lewis Tater (Jeff Bridges): “If a person saying he was something was all there was to it, this country’d be full of rich men and good-looking women. Too bad it isn’t that easy. In short, when someone says you’re a writer, that’s when you’re a writer…not before.” Good advice. But where do you find some “someones” who count? A few years ago, I entered my first feature-length screenplay in five reputable contests. All things considered, it fared well. The PAGE awards chose it as a Semi-Finalist in the Drama category, and three others (including Scriptapolooza) rated it as a Quarter-Finalist. These honors gave me the inalienable right to do, well, pretty much do what I just did. Boast about it a little….

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