Visiting with my dear Wa-Hi brother Mike Friedman, August 2019, about our High School Days and our hitchhiking adventures, in 1962-1963, from Walla Walla to New York City and then across Europe, including West and East Berlin, right after the Cuban Missile Crisis. As I look back I just shake my head!
Two wild weeks in New York, with one night at the Palisades Park, in New Jersey, and of course, we had to go to the Peppermint Lounge, with Joey Dee and the Starlighters, and do the Twist.
We also loved Greenwich Village, and the Cafes, Why? and Why Not? This is where we met and hung out with Richie Havens, who was dirt poor at the time. Brother Richie went on to be a major voice at the Woodstock Concert.
Then we took a freighter ride from the Brooklyn Navy Yards, along the East Coast to Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Norfolk, Virginia, and then across the Atlantic to Bremerhaven, Germany. We were on a C4 Freighter carrying military cargo.
From the first day we arrived in Bremerhaven, the adventures deepened. In fact, the true story is stranger and more humorous than fiction. These were days of freedom and a certain innocence, that our younger generations, may never be able to experience, for a while. I am grateful for these 76 winters that have passed so swiftly.
