Exercising my Mind

Tommy Towery

LHS '64

Back at Lee High School in the Sixties, my exercise came from my Physical Education (PE) classes, and was comprised of various sports and exercise classes required of me and my classmates. I also did a lot of physical activities as part of my participation in the Boy Scouts, such as hiking, canoeing, and swimming. PE classes continued in my college days and from there the Air Force insisted on keeping me in shape.

These days, my exercise program is a self-administered routine of walking a mile and a half three times a week on the track at my church’s gym. I am usually the only one on the track and it helps me enjoy the walk by listening to my Pandora music app and my Bluetooth earbuds. I listen to Golden Oldies as I make the loops. And that period of my day is when my mind wanders back to those teenage years which now seem so wonderful compared to the adult life I live today. 

Each song that plays seems to remind me of things that I did back when they were popular and were played on WAAY radio or the boy-girl parties I attended back then. Some take me back to those dance-filled nights at Bradley’s Cafeteria and others to the nights at Carter’s Skateland. 

Those who frequented Carter's may remember there was a big light box on the wall that would be lit with the current skate selection offered. It included "Ladies Only", "Three skate", "Reverse Skate", "Two-Step", and a few others. Besides the slow songs normally played, each night we usually formed a circle and did the Hokey Pokey, with most of the boys best enjoying watching the “put your hip in and shake it all about” sequences. There was also a "traffic cop" type skater with a whistle, which would be blown to announce any infraction of the skating rules, such as skating too fast, which was often violated. 

My Carter’s soundtrack memories are mostly the slow songs we skated to and the occasional fast ones like “Way Down Yonder in New Orleans”, “Down Yonder” and “Wild One”. I have repeatedly written that the skating rink was the site of my puberty change from a crazy kid to a girl-interested teenager. When I first started going to Carter’s I was a student at Huntsville Junior High, and most of the males I went with were also from that school. However, looking back, even then I found that I spent most of my time skating with girls from Lee; and there were a lot of them. 

Some of my early skating partners were Pam Grooms, Barbara Seeley, Sherry Adcox, Dianne Hughey, Carolyn McCutcheon, Ginger Cagle, and Carol Jean Williams to name a handful. I had a crush on a few of them at different times in my skating life.  There were others as well, but that little group provided me with hours of fun and exercise as we spent the night in wonderful no-worry bliss listening and skating to that soundtrack of our youth. And to go with the song, there was a “Wild One” in my life it seemed. 

I owned a pair of precision skates, given to me by Gene Bales, a Huntsville High School friend of my brother Don. I kept them at the skating rink and each night after paying my fee to get in would just go up to counter and ask for them. Our music of the evening was 45 rpm records played from a glass enclosed room at the front door. Many times I would look through the window and see what song would be playing next so I could position myself next to a girl I wanted to skate with.

There was another little less-known ritual observed at Carter’s. About the time of the last skate song being played, some of the teenage couples would “go outside.” They would go to the dark side of the building (away from facing the Parkway) for some semi-private “good-night kiss” time. I say semi, for there would always be several couples observing the same private time. 

I still have my skates, but these days my skating sessions are only in my memory, and the songs that take me back to that place are some of the best memories I have. I walk, not skate, around and around the track at my church, but my mind skates to the songs of yesterday and I hold the hand of some special partners. I always thought my night was a loss if somehow I could not find a partner to skate the “last skate” with. Some of my early skate partners are gone now, but they still live-on in my memories and I hope they always will. I do have a date to go skating with my grandkids who have just moved to Kentucky. I have to show them that a 79-year old Boompa can still skate. Only God knows when I will enjoy my "last skate."

The Wayback Machine

Wild One

"Wild One" is a song performed by Bobby Rydell and released as a single in 1960.

The song became a big hit for Rydell, spending 16 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 peaking at No. 2, and was kept from the No. 1 position by "Theme from A Summer Place" by Percy Faith. The song also peaked at No. 10 on the R&B chart.

Outside the US, "Wild One" went to No. 7 in the United Kingdom, No. 11 in Australia, and No. 2 in Canada, co-charting with "Little Bitty Girl".

Although it is not a place where you can take Huntsville visitors to see, because it no longer exists; Carter's Skateland is certainly a place that I hold dear to my heart. 

I asked Microsoft's Co-Pilot AI engine to tell me about Carter's and this is the reply: Carter’s Skateland in Huntsville, Alabama,  locals who grew up skating there. The rink featured a concrete floor, which some skaters found challenging but memorable. It was a popular spot for birthday parties, weekend hangouts, and learning to skate—often with a few bumps and bruises along the way. There’s still an active Facebook group where former patrons share memories, photos, and stories from their time at Carter’s Skateland. If you’re looking to reconnect with that era or dig deeper into its history, that community might be a great place to start.

As an extra bonus this week's expanded edition of Lee's Traveller includes a skating-related story I wrote over 20 years ago for my first book, and which I am happy to share with you today.

The Tao of Roller Skating - 

The First Ten Observations

Tommy Towery

LHS '64

During the Thanksgiving holiday season of 2002, at age 56,  I made a trip back to Huntsville and, while there, ventured into an arena reminiscent of my youth.  In the Fifties and Sixties, my home away from home was Carter’s Skateland on Traylor Island. I went there every Wednesday, and most Friday and Saturday nights, and crossed the puberty barrier while on wheels, I think.   During this latest experience I visited a skating rink, but not Carter's. I made a few astute observations which I shall now share with you in a somewhat random order. Most of these observations were of other skaters, but there was a time when most of them could have been you or me.

Observation #1 - No matter how good of a skater you are, your ability to keep from falling down is directly proportional to the skating ability of the little kid that is directly in front of you.

I still find it strange that five decades have not changed the fact that some small kids can continue to make it around a skating rink in a perpetual falling state.  From the moment they enter the floor, they seem to be falling forward with skates clanking and arms waving and their bodies in a forward list.  They continue to look the same all the way around the floor, without actually falling unless you pull up behind them and have no direction to go except in their harm's way. Also on this same note is the idea that some kids do not, in fact, skate, but actually only walk in shoes that have wheels attached to them.

Observation #2 - God meant for mankind to skate counterclockwise. 

Any attempt to skate in the opposite direction is counter to God's and nature's plans.  It seems so awkward when the P.A. system announces to reverse direction and you find yourself skating in a counterclockwise circle where you have to cross the left foot over the right, instead of the right foot over the left in the turn.

Observation #3 - Skating and chewing gum cannot co-exist in the universe.

It was so when we skated at Carter's and it remains so today.  It is not the physical skills needed to chew gum and skate at the same time that pose the problem; it is the physical law stating that wheels do not roll when coming in contact with chewing gum on the floor. 

Observation #4 - When spinning wheels come to an abrupt halt, Newton's First Law of Motion and gravity take over.

As we learned at Lee High School, that law states:  "Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it."  See Observation #3 for one possible explanation or close your eyes and think of a concrete block wall or metal guard rail for other possibilities. 

Observation #5 - Whether it is called The Domino Principle, chain reaction, or an avalanche, does not matter; it still holds true that one person can be responsible for taking out a whole line of other skaters.

All it takes is for one person falling to reach out and grab another skater, who in turn does the same, and before you know it, bodies fill the floor with thumps and oofs.

Observation #6 - Skaters have a blind spot and are vulnerable to any unexpected attack from that side.

No matter how long we have skated, we still don't expect some fast moving body to cut across the middle of the floor at reckless speed and hit us from the left side. We watch in front, and we watch to the right, and sometimes even watch behind us, but we still can't seem to understand that the threat will come from the unwatched side.  We truly don't expect anyone to come across traffic and hit us from the no-man's land of the center of the rink.

Observation #7 - The "left-hip-in", the "right-hip-in", and the "backside-in" are still the favorite parts of watching the girls do the Hokey Pokey for the male gender, and one of the first places that girls learn to flirt with body motions. Enough said!

Observation #8 - Some music seems to stay popular forever at a skating rink.

I was amazed at how many of "our" songs were played during the two hours we spent at the roller rink.  Of course the newer skaters don't do the same skate to them that we did.  A prime example of that idea is the song "Wipe Out."  I was very surprised to hear it start up and watch all the young kids rush to the floor to skate to it.  Only when I heard the announcer yell "wipe out!" and saw all the kids fall to the ground did I understand what their fun was in this song.  The last one standing was the loser. I don't think we had a "skate" back in our early years where we tried to fall down, but that did not stop us from doing so.

Observation #9 - There is still a primal progression as to how a boy and girl skate together in a couple's skate.

Phase One still seems to be just the boy and girl holding hands while they skate together and trying not to pull each other down as they do so.  Phase Two is what I call the classic couple skate, where the relationship moves forward and the boy puts his right hand on the girl's right hip and they hold each other's left hand. Finally Phase Three is where one or the other of the sexes skates backwards and the boy puts both of his hands on the girl's waist and she puts her hand on his shoulders or around his neck.  This is the one I remember doing the most at Carter's with my favorite partner.  Of course, this maneuver comes with the danger of the one skating backwards falling down and the other partner falling on top of the other one.

And that finally brings us to:

Observation #10 - The skating rink is one of the first arenas in which many are exposed to and participate in mating rituals.

I observed a new one in today's time that I do not seem to remember from our days at Carter's.  If there is a "Boy's only" skate, the little girls sit on the side of the rink and hold out their hands trying to lure the males into touching them as they speed past.  It reminds me of Beatlemania when the girls screamed and held out their hands to John, Paul, George, and Ringo, wanting them to acknowledge them and touch them as they performed.  Only in this case, the girls did not scream, but it was still obvious that they had certain boys whose attention they requested.

In Conclusion: I know there are many other observations that I can relate to you, but this short list should give you the idea of the things that I saw. This might be the basis of a new book for me. Skating is still fun whether you use in-line skates or classic four wheel skates. And there were still times that in the dimness of the colored lights and the sound of the old music that I could let my mind wander and have just as easily been 15 and skating at Carter's Skateland.

Last Week's Questions, Answers, And Comments

Delores McBride Kilgore, LHS '66, "Got it, thanks! I enjoyed the tour quiz! A lot of people were close to each other on favorite places!"