The Music Box was a dance hall located at the eastern end of Houghton Lake in Prudenville Michigan. It was started by Lee and Shirley Kelly in 1946 shortly after Lee returned from World War II. They owned land near the intersection of Michigan highways M-18 and M-55. They realized that the local teens didn’t have any place in the area for entertainment. They poured a cement slab and set up a juke box in a small building in the center. They invited the teens to come dance on Saturday nights.
By 1948 they had enlarged the slab and put a partial wall and fence around the dance floor. They charged a nickel entry to help defray the cost of buying all the latest records. At that point it officially became The Music Box.
There were other such gathering places located in Michigan during my teen years. The Hideout (Harper Woods), The Pony Tail Club (Harbor Springs), The Note (Gun Lake), The Pavilion (Devils Lake) , Band Canyon (Bay City), Mt. Holly (Flint), The Scene (St. Ignace), and The Roostertail (Detroit) are examples of the teen dance gathering spots throughout the state.
I made it to The Hideout with a high school girlfriend during my senior year, The Roostertail with a college girl, and stag to The Music Box at least twice. When I took a girl I was on a date. When I went to The Music Box, I was looking for one.
The first time I went to The Music Box was the week-end of my eighteenth birthday. I went with a co-worker from the grocery store where I worked. We were going camping near Houghton Lake for the Memorial Day week-end. His name was Bruce Henderlight. I don’t always provide the full name of my blog subjects, but this is an exception.
Bruce was from Berkley High School and started working at the National Grocery Store about the same time I did. Bruce was the only guy from Berkley. The rest of us attended Royal Oak Dondero. Bruce owned his own car and reminded me a bit of Ed “Kooky” Burns. He was always combing his hair.
The crew threw a surprise birthday party for me on Friday, May 28th, the evening before my actual birthday. Bruce and I had made plans to go camping at Houghton Lake on Saturday and Sunday before heading home on Monday. Bruce’s cousin traveled with us. The only present that I remember from that birthday was a yellow, short-sleeve, buttoned down collar, oxford shirt. In fact, it’s one of the few presents I remember from any birthday.
Bruce and his cousin picked me up at my house early Saturday morning. Bruce had a tent and all the gear. I brought a sleeping bag and my clothes. I wore my new shirt for the trip north.
Bruce’s cousin was a smoker. Bruce and I were not. The cousin sat in the backseat so the smoke could exit the car through the rear. We had all the windows open which made conversations between the front and rear difficult to hear. Bruce’s cousin leaned forward from time to time so that he could be more engaged in our conversation. During one of his leans, he dropped his cigarette on the back of my shirt. By the time he retrieved it, I had a hole in my brand new shirt. That’s the reason that I remember the gift at all.
The only other thing that I remember from our trip was our first night at The Music Box. The dance floor was open air. It had block walls, a few benches around the perimeter, a great sound system, and a lot of high school and college age kids. The crowd was especially large because it was a holiday week-end and the unofficial beginning of summer.
Everyone collected in small groups. Most of the girls stayed in self-claimed pools, while most of the boys were on patrol. (It reminded me of junior high dances at Clara Barton.) Our pack of three wandered in, around, and through the crowd sizing up the place. It was the first such trip for the cousin and me, but it wasn’t Bruce’s first rodeo.
After about twenty minutes of walking around, we zeroed in on three girls, and asked them to dance. (We pre-selected our intended partner.) I don’t remember the girls or the dance. The only thing I remember was Bruce introducing himself to his girl as Jimmy Smith. We danced with the girls a few times and then we moved on. Each time we moved, and met new girls, Bruce was “Jimmy Smith”.
At some point I asked him why he was using a different name. His answer was clear and concise. “I’m not looking to get married this week-end, but if I accidently try to pick up some guy’s girl friend tonight, I’d rather that he be looking for Jimmy Smith than Bruce Henderlight”.
That made a lot of sense to me, so I adopted a similar course of action for selected occasions for the remainder of my dating years. Although it happened very few times, whenever I was in unfamiliar territory for the evening, I offered my name to the ladies as Bruce Henderlight.
So far, so good.
TBC