INTERVIEW WITH BILL FAY
Version 3.3


Interviewee:		Bill Fay, Senior Manager 1947
Interviewer:		Dan Cheatham, Drum Major, 1957
Date of Interview:	November 26, 1991
Transcriber:		Susie Thomas


[Minor revisions for clarity and grammar by Dan Cheatham.  
Inserted by Tim Castro on 3/29/92, 6/30/92, 7/17/92 and 
8/21/92]
[Revisions for fact, clarity and grammar by Bill Fay.  
Inserted by Tim Castro on 7/1/92]
[Revisions for fact, clarity and grammar by Paul Bostwick, 
Student Director, 1957.  Inserted by Tim Castro on 7/19/92]


[Following editorial notes are attributed as thus:	Bill 
Fay - BF
					Norden H. (Dan) Cheatham - NHC
					Tim Castro - TC
					Paul Bostwick - PB]


Keywords:	Uniforms, Campus Life/1930's, 1933 Rose Bowl, 
Chris Tellefsen, Charles Cushing, Baton Society, Jon/Albert 
Elkus, 1936 Bay Bridge Opening (Performance), 1939 World's 
Fair at Treasure Island (Performance), WW II, Band Audition, 
Room 5 Eshleman Hall, Bonfire Rallies, Big Game Week in the 
1940's, Drum Beat (High Step Cadence), Card Stunts, Post 
Game, Post-War Band, Bob Desky, Dan Cheatham, Bill 
Ellsworth, Pappy Waldorf, Straw Hat Bands (Origins), Bob 
Sproul, Ernie Nagel, Field Rehearsals, Music Rehearsals 
(Under Cushing), Charter Day, William Denney, James Berdahl, 
Igor Stravinsky, Band in ASUC Structure. Lie Down Stunt, 
Stage Show, "Take It Away."


Introduction:

955 Mendocino Avenue, Berkeley

Was in the Band 1942-43, 46-48  (Trombone)
Senior Manager - 1947-48, his senior year
(before that he was junior manager)

Dan:  When was your first vivid recollection of the Cal 
Band?

Bill:  My first recollection of the Cal Band was in 1935, 
when I was a student at Garfield Junior High School Berkeley 
[Now called Martin Luther King, Junior High School. - BF], 
and my brother Ed entered Cal and joined the Cal Band as a 
trumpet player.  And one of Ed's friends was Arnold Wulfraat 
who played trombone, and my first experience with the Cal 
Band was watching the Band during the football in season in 
1935.  Arnold Wulfraat was a trombone in the front row and I 
was quite impressed by him.  I'd never played any 
instrument, and at Garfield Junior High, Mr. Minzyk was 
recruiting for the Garfield Band, and he said "I'd like you 
to play flute Bill, I need a flute in the Band."  I said, 
"No, I'd rather play trombone, like my brother's friend  
Arnold Wulfraat because he's in the front row of the Cal 
Band and I was impressed by that."   And Mr. Minzyk said 
"Well, I don't need a trombone player right now,  I'll start 
you out but you can't play in the band until I have a 
vacancy for you."  So that was how I started to play the 
trombone.  He gave me lessons and after six months or a 
year, there was a vacancy in the Garfield Band and I began 
to play. So I've played trombone since 1935, and this is 
1991 - that's almost 60 years that I've played the trombone.

Dan:  That's very interesting Bill.  What I'd like to hear 
from you now is what are your recollections of what that 
Band looked like at that point and what it did?

Bill:  Arnold Wulfraat used to come down to our house and he 
and my brother would practice together - Ed on the trumpet 
and Arnold on the trombone.  They'd practice some of the 
marches and things that they played in the Band for the 
coming Saturday football game.  So I went to some of the 
games, even in those days the Cal Band came out of the North 
Tunnel at the beginning of the game.  The uniforms were 
white pants with a blue and gold stripe on the seam, and 
they had blue coats with a white leather Sam Browne belt, 
military style cap which I think was blue and white with a 
gold band.  I especially enjoyed the trombones because the 
right guide was always a trombone player.  The trombones 
marched in the front row, and the right guide was the one 
who set the pace and the players would try to keep in line 
with him.  [Mr. Berdahl's interview also talks about the 
importance of the right guide. - NHC]  Professor Cushing was 
the leader of the band already in '35.  He was quite a young 
professor with a black beard, very military looking, 
academic looking.  He never wore a uniform.  He wore a blue 
coat, sometimes gray slacks or something but never wore a 
band uniform the way that Bob Briggs does now.  

Dan:  Bill, I'd like to come back to Charles Cushing later.  
(Off tape, Bill reminded me that Cushing's nickname was 
"Cush the Bush"  because of his goatee.)  For the moment, 
I'd like to explore what knowledge you might have of the 
earliest days of the band, particularly the transition from 
the ROTC band to the ASUC band.  Do you have insight or 
knowledge of the campus politics of the time, student 
politics of the time and the historical aspects of the 
change to the ASUC.  Now I realize you weren't a bandsman in 
those days, but I hope you might have some recollections of 
it, and can help establish as much as possible, the origins 
of the ASUC Band.  

Bill:  As I understood it, the original Band was an ROTC 
band of the ROTC unit starting in 1891 just 100 years ago, 
and it was a military band which played for the military 
drills and ROTC parades and such things and also I imagine 
for athletic contests, but I don't know that for sure.  I 
think it was in the 1920's that the Band came under the ASUC 
and was separated from the ROTC, probably in the 1920's, and 
became an activity of the Associated Students, University of 
California, the ASUC. I think it was sometime in the 1920's 
- I don't know that date for sure.  In front of Dan are two 
copies of the Blue and Gold, 1921 & 1925, and I believe that 
the Band was still ROTC Band.  We'll look in the Blue and 
Gold and find out.

Dan:  Bill, what I'm looking for is any recollections you 
might have with regard to the student politics.  There must 
have been some reason why it switched from ROTC to ASUC, and 
perhaps you might have heard some anecdotes along these 
lines.  If you don't have this information, we'll move on to 
something else.  (Bill says he doesn't have any insight.)

Bill, would you take a few moments to tell us about your 
family connections with the University.

Bill:  My family goes a long way back in the University.  My 
mother came here in 1894 when her Dad came to be Chairman of 
the Latin department in 1894.  My dad came as a young 
professor of French in 1914, and thought a good way to 
secure his future in University would be to court the 
daughter of the Chairman of the Latin department, which he 
did.  My parents were married in 1916 at St. Mark's church 
and moved here to this house on Mendocino in 1922, just a 
year before the North Berkeley fire.  Their old house was on 
Hilgard just above Euclid and it was burned to the ground in 
the '23 fire, but they moved here the year before in 
anticipation of my birth. The family was getting larger and 
they needed a larger house, and so they came here in 1922.  
I was born in 1923.  

Dan:  Do you have any recollections of attending any campus 
events as a family, thus sealing your bond with the 
University which eventually (and we'll get to this later) 
got to your playing in the Cal Band?

Bill:  We always went to events at the University.  I can 
remember especially having dinner at the Faculty Club with 
my grandmother who was a widow since 1930 and often she 
would take us to dinner at the Faculty Club.  At that time 
there was a women's dining room on the North Side of the 
Faculty Club where the long porch is, and we'd have dinner 
there and walk across the 1910 Bridge, which was a gift of 
my mother's class.  She graduated in 1910.   And on Charter 
Day, I remember as a little boy going to Charter Day.  
President Herbert Hoover had just gone out of office but 
came representing Stanford University.  And we were walking 
down from the Greek Theater back toward the Campanile, and 
my aunt was said "there goes HH, there goes HH."  Herbert 
Hoover was walking just in front of us going down from the 
Greek Theater.  I was quite impressed to see a former 
president of the United States walking along.  I don't 
remember whether the Band or the orchestra played.  Later, 
when I was a student myself, sometimes the Band would play 
and sometimes the orchestra.  If they needed another 
trombone, they would often call me from the Band to come and 
play in the orchestra, and I played several times in the 
orchestra when they needed extra trombones for commencement 
or Charter Day or different things like that.  Mr. Wm. 
Denney was director of the orchestra, and Cushing was 
director of the Band. Charles C. Cushing was the first 
permanent director, I think, of the ASUC Band. Charles C. 
Cushing, "CCC" or "Cush the Bush," was the nickname that we 
gave him.

Dan:  Let's talk a bit about the time your brother was in 
the Band and his adventures. 

Bill:  My brother Ed entered Cal in 1935, and played in the 
Band all four years as a trumpet player.  He was quite 
heavy, quite stout.  They went to the Rose Bowl I think in 
'38.  Ed was very heavy, and the parade is a real man 
killer.  The Rose Parade goes up Colorado Avenue, and they 
said "Who are those three men playing the trumpet in the Cal 
Band?"  It was my brother Ed, cause he was very fat.  He 
found the parade very tiresome, because he was terribly 
overweight, even at that time.  Ed was very active in the 
Band, and the Band politics.  He helped to put on the show, 
"Take It Away," in '38 with Jim Berdahl and Don Johnson who 
were the two who produced it.  The purpose was to raise 
money to send the Band to Portland for the Oregon game.  
This was a stage show in the Campus Theater on Bancroft Way.  
[This was a movie theater and is now the home of the campus 
Development Office. - NHC]   The Band sold tickets and they 
themselves were the actors.  It was kind of a variety show.  
My brother Ed was in charge of ticket sales and promotion of 
the show.  Unfortunately, they didn't raise enough money to 
send the band to Portland, which was the purpose of the 
play.  But they were able to use the money to help with 
uniforms and other Cal Band expenses.  [The 1938 Blue and 
Gold says, "To add to their funds, the Band presented an 
original musical comedy, `Take It Away', on November 5 and 
6.  The show, although not highly successful in dramatic 
technique, contained several versatile musical numbers.  
With proceeds of this function, the Band purchased a 
Glockenspiel, or small portable xylophone."  For additional 
information, see the Abe Hankin interview. - NHC]  My 
brother Ed was a Sophomore Manager and then a Junior 
Manager, and he was not elected Senior Manager.  His good 
friend Bart Keene was the other Junior Manager, and Bart 
Keene was chosen to be Senior Manager.  My brother Ed was 
honored with the Bell trophy for the most valuable member of 
the Cal Band.  Since he didn't make Senior Manager they gave 
him the Bell Trophy.  I have a picture of him holding that 
trophy in 1939, when he was a senior and he was given the 
Bell trophy, which is still in use I understand.  I'm not 
sure, my brother may have been the first to receive the Bell 
trophy.  I'll get a picture of it and show it to Dan.  
[Edward A. Fay received the Bell Award in 1939.  He was the 
eighth recipient of this award. - NHC]

Dan:  The Bell trophy is still awarded.  Back to the 
business of the trip to Portland.  There was one other 
individual who was active and involved in the Band in those 
days.  Do you remember Chris Tellefsen?  Do you have any 
recollections?

Bill:    I remember as a teenager hanging around the band 
room with my brother Ed when I was still in high school and 
he was in college.  Chris Tellefsen was in charge of the 
uniform room.  He was kind of an unofficial grandfather for 
the Cal Band.  He used to tell stories about the gold rush 
days up in the Klondike in Alaska when he had been a gold 
miner in his youth.  He would regale the bandsmen with the 
stories about the exploits and the adventures up there in 
the gold rush country.  My brother Ed was very fond of Chris 
Tellefsen.  He used to come home and tell us some of the 
stories that Chris had told.  I'm sure that I met him during 
the late 1930's when my brother Ed was in the Band.  
Actually I was in junior high still at that time.

Dan:  Bill, these first hand recollections of yours of this 
period are really quite valuable because we have little or 
no materials on this period of the Band. Before we move on 
toward coming up to date, would you take a few more moments 
to ad lib on any other thoughts that come to your mind about 
this period.

Bill:  I don't know just when Charles Cushing became 
director of the Band, but he was already the director in 
1935 when my brother entered the Band because Cushing had 
tryouts for prospective bandsmen, and my brother Ed had to 
come and play the trumpet for Mr. Cushing in '35 to be 
admitted as a freshman in the Band, so I know that he joined 
the Band before that.  I have another memory of Professor 
Cushing.  His wife Charlotte Cerf was a French major and one 
of my father's doctoral candidates in the French department.  
She was one of dad's students.  It was quite interesting 
when she married Professor Cushing.  Her name was Charlotte 
Cerf, initials "CC."  Then she married Cushing, so she 
became "CCC," which were also Professor Cushing's initials. 
They were married probably in the early '30's. I think he 
was already married in '35 when we first knew him with the 
Cal Band.  But we knew him earlier as the fiancee of my 
dad's graduate student, Charlotte Cerf in the French 
department.  I believe she was the daughter of a department 
store owner in San Francisco.  I don't know if it was The 
White House, or one of those big department stores, O'Conner 
Moffitt or The White House or the Emporium.  But I think her 
father was in business in San Francisco, a wealthy family 
and she was a very lovely woman, a very lovely young woman.

[The Executive Committee of the Band (Senior Manager, 
Student Director, Drum Major, and Rep.-at-Large plus Mr. 
Cushing) met once every month or so, to discuss plans, 
policy, etc. for the Band.  Ordinarily the Exec Com would 
meet at the Band Room (5 Eshleman Hall) or 175 Men's Gym 
(our rehearsal room), but once or twice a year we would be 
invited to the Cushings' house on Summer Street in North 
Berkeley, for our meeting.  Mrs. Cushing would prepare 
elegant hors d'oeuvres for us to eat, and Mr. Cushing served 
martini/cocktails.  The martinis were quite strong, and I 
can remember feeling rather light-headed before the meeting 
was over.  The Exec Com Meetings featured good fellowship 
among the Band Leadership, as well as attending to details 
of Band business.  The meetings were always very enjoyable, 
jokes and fun abounded. - BF]

Alumni reunions, the night before the Big Game, the Band 
would always go to the San Francisco hotels for the 
different alumni reunions, and my brother would come home 
and tell us about those.  Sometimes they would split it into 
two bands and they would go in chartered buses to cover all 
the reunions in one evening.  It was a great party time, 
some of the alumni would insist on buying drinks for the 
Band and not all of them came back fully sober after that 
evening.  

Herbert R. Fairchild was the Senior Manager in 1935.  I 
remember his name.  My brother got interested in Band 
politics very early.  He became a Sophomore Manager in '36 
and Junior Manager in '37.  Another name that I remember at 
that time was Dick Lowe who was the student conductor in '37 
or '38.  Dick Lowe worked with Jim Berdahl and Don Johnson 
on the Cal Band show "Take it Away" at the Campus Theater. 
Another Band officer I remember was Abe Hanken, [The correct 
spelling is Hankin. - TC] who was Junior Manager the year 
after my brother and I think he went on to be Senior Manager 
in '39 or '40.

Dan:  Do you recollect a band organization called the "Baton 
Society," and what can you tell us about that?

Bill:  The Baton Society was an honor society for members of 
the Cal Band who had a certain grade point average, and it 
made a significant contribution to the life of the Band.  We 
did have smokers.  [A "smoker" is a general term for a 
formal dinner banquet.  The "college boys" would get dressed 
up and act like "adults."  After dessert, they would relax 
and smoke cigars while the program was coming to an end. - 
NHC]  Sometimes on the third floor of Stephens Union where 
there was a large banquet room on the top floor of the old 
Stephens Union.  Sometimes we'd have it at one of the 
fraternity houses.  My brother had been in the Baton Society 
during his time in the Band and I was a member when I was in 
Band.  I remember we had a smoker in the Baton Society, and 
we would smoke cigars and drink beer and just a general 
party time.  We had a pin we wore on our lapel which was a 
little blue and gold "C" with a tiny baton across the "C."   
The baton of course being the conductor's baton which he 
uses to conduct the music.  We wore coats and ties to the 
smoker, it was kind of an informal social evening.  Maybe we 
played cards, or if there was a pool table in the fraternity 
house or the place where we met, people could play pool or 
different games.  Just a social evening, drinking beer, 
smoking cigars or cigarettes, which isn't done today.  

I attended the Spring Concert at the Men's Gymnasium, now 
called Harmon Arena. Apparently, Mr. Cushing was brand new 
as the band director in 1935 according to the 1935 Blue and 
Gold so perhaps that was his first year.  They always played 
very classical music, pieces for symphonic band, and it was 
really a beautiful concert.  The men's gym was very well 
filled, maybe four or five thousand people would come to 
hear that concert.  Seeing the marching band when I was in 
junior high school at football games, and my brother would 
tell of the basketball games where a smaller group would 
play, a pep band for the basketball games in the '30's.  I 
don't remember if it was 55 people, but I know it was a much 
smaller band than they used on the football field for the 
football games.  As I remember in the fall Band was an 
activity, and in the Spring it was a University course.  We 
didn't get any academic credit for participation in the 
marching band.  We did get academic credit for the concert 
band in the Spring.  That's my memory of it during the years 
that I was in the Band, and I suspect it was the same in the 
'30's when my brother was in the Band.

Dan:  The 1936 Blue and Gold mentions that the Band went to 
the State Fair in Sacramento.  Do you have any recollections 
of that? 

Bill:  I remember in the late 1930's when my brother was in 
the Band, they would have chartered buses that would take 
them to play at the State Fair during the 1930's. They would 
usually march around the fairgrounds a little bit, and 
perhaps give a concert at the grandstand or some other 
public place on the fairgrounds.  This did not continue into 
the 1940's when I myself was in the Band.

Dan:  Tell us about Band trips to Los Angeles and the Big 
Game. 

Bill:  Chris Tellefsen always went along on these trips to 
Los Angeles and he helped to make arrangements for the 
chartered buses and so on, which would meet the train at 
Union Station and the Band would be taken to the Figueroa 
hotel and be assigned their rooms.  If the game was at UCLA, 
the Band would go on Thursday night and attend a University 
meeting on the Westwood campus on Friday, and play in the 
Homecoming parade of UCLA on Friday evening, and then play 
for the game on Saturday.  If the game was with USC, the 
Band would make the trip on Friday night and arrive in time 
for a rehearsal at Bovard field on the USC campus before the 
game in the Coliseum.  Then the Band would stay Saturday 
night at the Figueroa hotel and have a chance for partying 
in Los Angeles, and the train would return Sunday night.

Dan:  The Drum Major in 1936 was Ernest O. Nagel.  Do you 
have any recollections of him?

Bill:  Ernie Nagel, when he was Drum Major in 1936, he was 
very tall, very handsome, very military looking.  He was a 
good friend of my brother Ed.  Yeah, very tall!  The student 
conductor in those days was called "captain" rather than 
student conductor, and I suspect this was a holdover from 
the days when it was an ROTC Band, and they had military 
designation.  Apparently somewhere between the 30's and 40's 
they changed the designation of the student conductor to 
call him the student director rather than the captain of the 
Band.

Dan:  The 1936 Blue and Gold says the University Symphony 
was directed by Albert I. Elkus.  Could you tell us anything 
about Albert Elkus to lay the ground work for later on when 
we talk about his son Jonathan?

Bill:  Albert Elkus was professor of music during the 
1930's, and director of the orchestra.  He was a full 
professor and colleague of my father.  I remember he was a 
very dignified man.  Very short and very stocky, very 
distinguished musician, Albert Elkus, and he was director of 
the symphony orchestra.  [A large lecture room in the 
current music building, Morrison Hall, is named for Albert 
Elkus. - NHC]

Dan:  During the same general period, 1936, '37, '38, and 
even '39 there were some major public events at which the 
Band appeared at.  Could you give us any insight as to any 
of those?

Bill:  One of those public events was the opening of the San 
Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge I believe in 1936.  The Cal 
Band was invited to come and participate.  They marched out 
onto the bridge and played a short concert at the dedication 
of the bridge in 1936.  My brother was quite impressed with 
being able to take part in this.  It was a very great day, 
and the Cal Band was really honored to take part in the 
opening of the Bay Bridge.  1939 was the World's Fair at 
Treasure Island.  It started in February 1939 until November 
and then again in 1940, it ran from spring until the fall.  
The Cal Band played in the opening day and my brother was a 
part of that in February 1939. The Band gave a concert and 
paraded up and down the fairgrounds for the opening of the 
Fair.  Later on during the Fair other college bands and high 
school bands from all over the state were invited to come 
and spend the day.  The Berkeley High School Band played at 
the Fair one day I remember.  We had chartered buses, both 
for the Cal Band when they went to play at the World's Fair, 
and then again when I was in the Berkeley High band we had 
chartered buses, so there was no problem with going on 
public transportation.  Special buses were ordered to take 
the Band to those events.  I don't remember much about the 
lunches.  Maybe we were left on our own to buy lunch at the 
various stands that were available on the fairgrounds.

Dan:  What are your personal recollections of the Fair 
itself?  Were you awed by it? Were you wowed by it?  Did you 
have any particularly unusual adventures that you remember 
even to this day?

Bill:  The Fair was very impressive.  This was called the 
"Celebration of the Pacific," and all of the Pacific 
nations, Japan, China, the Philippines, had exhibits there.  
A very great international flavor.  There was also a place 
called the Gayway, which was the entertainment zone.  There 
were roller coaster rides and Ferris wheels and different 
kinds of entertainment.  One of the most famous with the 
young boys was the Sally Rand Nude Ranch, where girls played 
volleyball very scantily clad, and supposedly only adults 
could be admitted.  I remember going in high school with my 
fried Glen Heltne who was quite a large, husky looking guy.  
He wore a hat, coat and necktie and got in to see the Nude 
Ranch.  I was rather small for my age and had to wait 
outside while Glen went into Sally Rand's.  Glen Heltne was 
my classmate at Berkeley High.

Dan:  There is one more name during this period just before 
the 1940's that we should talk about.  Did you know Jim 
Berdahl.

Bill:  Jim Berdahl was the student conductor of the Band, or 
maybe he was called the captain of the Band, during 1937 or 
'38 when my brother was a junior and a senior in the Band.  
Berdahl was a good friend of my brother's.  They still keep 
in touch with each other, sending Christmas cards and 
greetings from time to time.  Berdahl was a music major, and 
went on of course to have a long association with the Cal 
Band, but it started during his student years.

Dan:  What can you tell us about the subsequent career of 
your brother?  What did he go on to after he graduated?

Bill:  My brother graduated in mathematics in 1939, and then 
did graduate study for two years at Harvard, and then a year 
at the University of Rochester, and went into the Army in 
1942 or '43 for World War II.  After the War, he came back 
and went to work for the Navy at the China Lake Naval 
Weapons Center up on the Mojave Desert about 60 miles north 
of the Mojave.  He spent his whole career there as a 
statistician working for the math department of the Naval 
Weapons Center.  Ed is now retired at China Lake, and I'm 
sorry to say not in good health.  He has bad emphysema, and 
is pretty much house bound.  He really loved his years in 
the Cal Band and his association with Jim Berdahl, Mr. 
Cushing, and Arnold Wulfraat, the trombone player that I 
mentioned was the one who first inspired me to play the 
trombone.  My brother Ed did some research for the Navy 
during his years at China Lake, and they gave him a year off 
to go to the University of Florida to complete doctoral 
studies using his research material that he had done for the 
Navy, so he earned a Ph.D. I believe in 1962 from the 
University of Florida.  He then returned to China Lake, and 
retired from there around 1980 or so. He retired from the 
Navy and continues to live there.  He was a civil servant, 
he was never a Navy personnel, but he was a civil servant 
mathematician working for the Navy Department at China Lake.

Dan:  Tell me of your personal activities up to the time you 
became a freshman at Cal.

Bill:  I should mention that my brother graduated from Cal 
in May of 1939, and my father who had been a professor of 
French took a sabbatical leave for 1939 and 1940. We went to 
Europe planning to spend the year in France, and my sister 
and I were enrolled in boarding school in Fontainebleu.  We 
spent the summer of '39 touring Holland, Belgium, France and 
Switzerland in our family Buick.  We took the Buick with us 
on the steamer from New York to Rotterdam.  The war broke 
out on September 1st of '39.  We were at that time in 
Brussels, where my father was attending the International 
Congress of Linguists.  Since the war started, we thought we 
better come back to the United States rather than stay in 
Europe, so we canceled the plans for boarding school in 
Fontainebleu.  My brother canceled his plans for graduate 
study at Trinity College, Cambridge, and he was able to get 
a steamer fairly quickly and transferred his graduate 
studies to Harvard.  From 1939, '40 and '41 he was a 
graduate student at Harvard getting his masters degree 
there.  My mother and father and sister and I had to wait 
about six weeks before we could get a ship home from Belgium 
because the shipping was so crowded at the beginning of the 
war, many refugees were fleeing from Germany.  It took six 
weeks to get passage.  We finally sailed about the middle of 
October from Antwerp to New York.  It was very scary going 
across The English Channel.  The first few nights, the ship 
had to anchor every night because of the fear of German 
submarines.  The ship anchored and turned the lights off.  
After we got away from English/British waters the ship used 
full flood lights at night shining on the Dutch flag and the 
Holland/America smoke stack to show that we were a neutral 
vessel.  We landed in New York around the 1st of November 
and settled in Belmont, Massachusetts, a suburb of 
Cambridge.  My father did his research study at the Widener 
library at Harvard instead of at the Sorbonne in Paris like 
he had planned.  My sister and I went to high school in 
Belmont, Massachusetts.  I played in the Belmont high school 
band that year.  In the spring of 1940, the Belmont high 
school band was invited to play at the New York World's 
Fair, so I had the distinction of visiting both World's 
Fairs, San Francisco and New York, in both 1939 and 1940!  
We returned to Berkeley in the summer of 1940, and my dad 
took up his studies again at Cal, his teaching at Cal.  I 
finished Berkeley High School in December 1941.  The 
Berkeley School had two classes in those days, the Christmas 
class finished in December and the Spring class in June.  I 
was in the December class, and our graduation was to have 
been in January '42 at the end of the semester.  Because of 
Pearl Harbor they decided to move up the graduation so we 
could graduate before Christmas.  So we hastily arranged a 
graduation ceremony at the Oaks [movie] theater on Solano 
[Ave.] [in Albany - PB] in December a week or two after 
Pearl Harbor, so the men in the class could go on to college 
right away in January, or many right into the Army or Navy.  
I chose to enter Cal in January 1942.

Dan:  I want to get into your specific activities in the Cal 
Band and your specific undergraduate activities in a while 
but for the next moment or two let's explore your service in 
the military.

Bill:  As I said, I entered Cal in January 1942, right after 
the beginning of the World War.  By the fall of 1942, they 
started the Enlisted Reserve Corps, and they told students 
if we would sign up for this Enlisted Reserve Corps, we 
would have a chance to finish our college degree and have a 
good shot at a commission.  So hundreds of male students 
signed up in the enlisted reserve corps in the fall of 1942.  
In March of 1943 the enlisted reserve corps was all put on 
active duty in the infantry, and there went our dreams of 
finishing college and getting our commission.  A hundred of 
us, actually three hundred students were put into the Army 
in three days.  We boarded trains at the Third and Townsend 
station in San Francisco on a Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. 
I was one of those three groups of a hundred.  Dean Stone, 
the Dean of Men, came over to the station each day and shook 
hands with all of us as we got onto the train to ride to 
Monterey to the induction center, where we were issued our 
uniforms and equipment.  From Monterey I was sent to Camp 
Robinson, Arkansas, an infantry training camp.  About a 
hundred of us from Cal were sent for basic training in 
Arkansas.  We were put into a training company along with 
several hundred other draftees, and the drill sergeant kept 
saying "You college jokers! You college jokers, fall in 
line!"  They treated us with a special interest because we 
were college students, and sometimes we caught some bad 
details [i.e. "Duty Assignments" like "K.P." - Kitchen 
Police. - NHC] which they were giving to us because of being 
college students.  After basic training, I had a chance to 
apply for specialized training in the ASTP (Army Specialized 
Training Program), and I was sent to the University of 
Wisconsin to study Italian because I had been a French major 
at Cal during my year and a half on the campus.  So I was 
sent to the University of Wisconsin to study Italian, 
theoretically to go over to Italy and work with the military 
government.  This was a 9 month course at the University of 
Wisconsin, and some forty or fifty of us were there.  Some 
in Italian, some in German, some in different foreign 
studies.  Unfortunately Congress abolished the ASTP after 
seven months.  We didn't know enough Italian to go to Italy, 
so we were sent to Atlanta, Georgia to the Atlanta Ordnance 
Depot, where there were Italian prisoners of war who had 
been captured in the Africa Desert Campaign.  We were 
assigned as interpreters to the Italian prisoners to teach 
them auto mechanics.  The Italian prisoners then performed 
mechanical work in the Ordnance Department replacing 
American soldiers for overseas duty.  I was one of those 
interpreters.  We learned the name for carburetor, and spare 
tire, and all the different parts of a car, and we 
interpreted the mechanics from the English mechanical 
teachers putting into Italian to train the Italian prisoners 
to do this mechanical work. From the Atlanta Ordnance Depot, 
I had a chance to apply for officer candidate school, and 
was sent to Aberdeen, Maryland to the Ordnance Officer 
Candidate School where I received a commission as a second 
lieutenant in the Ordnance Department, and was then sent to 
the Philippines.  By this time it was 1945, and the war in 
Europe was just ending.  By the time I arrived in Manila 
Bay, General MacArthur was sailing into Tokyo Bay for the 
signing of the surrender on the Battleship Missouri.  I 
spent a year in the Philippines as an Ordnance Lieutenant.  
I would sign property issuance slips in the morning, and in 
the afternoon my jeep driver and I would go down to the 
depot and get the spare parts that we had ordered for the 
trucks and jeeps and tanks and guns and things that we were 
taking care of in the Ordnance Department.  We were in 
Manila and also two other places on the northern part of the 
island.  I came back from the Army in the summer of 1946 
after a year in the Philippines and entered the University 
as a junior student in the Fall of 1946.  My brother also 
spent about three and a half years in the Army.  He served 
overseas in the European theater in an Ordnance watchmakers 
company repairing watches and binoculars and so forth in the 
Ordnance Department.  He then became a teacher in a clerks 
and typist school in Frankfurt, and that's where he finished 
the war and came back to California, also in 1946 when he 
was discharged from the Army.  

Dan:  Would you tell us about the events leading up to your 
actually joining and becoming a member of the Band?

Bill:  I entered Cal as a freshman in January 1942, and of 
course wanted to get into the Band right away, so I found 
that the first requirement was to have a try-out with 
Professor Cushing.  So I made an appointment with him and 
came for the try-out, I think it was on a Saturday morning, 
in the old music building which was a brown shingle building 
on the north side of the creek right across from where the 
Alumni House stands today.  [Now called "Dwinelle Annex." - 
NHC]  Mr. Cushing's office was upstairs and I came upstairs 
with my ancient trombone, this was the 1908 Buescher-Grand 
which I bought in junior high school.  It was a old 1908 
trombone with a large 12" bell, it had a very large bell. 
Buescher was a band instrument company in the Mid-West, and 
the Buescher Grand was their deluxe trombone, but it only 
cost $52, I bought it second-hand in 1936.  I brought it to 
Mr. Cushing's office for the try-out, and he gave me some 
sight-reading, some samples of the Symphonic Band music that 
we'd be playing during the Spring semester.  I had no idea 
what music he'd put out in front of me, and I played the 
best that I could.  I don't think it was too good, but he 
must have needed a third trombone player because he admitted 
me to the Band.  The Symphonic Band was smaller than the 
football band, probably 60-75 pieces, and he assigned me to 
be a third trombone player.  I think there were two firsts, 
two seconds, and two third trombone players.  I became a 
member of the Band.  We practiced twice a week, Tuesday and 
Thursday, from 4:30 to 6:00.  We met I think, in room 175, 
the Men's Gym which was a band rehearsal hall on the main 
floor of the Men's Gym [across the hall and to the north of 
the basketball arena - NHC] .  We had rehearsals twice a 
week and by April we were ready for the Spring Concert which 
was held on Sunday afternoon in the Men's Gymnasium.  A week 
or two later we were taken by buses to Davis for Picnic Day 
and repeated the concert there for the audience at the Davis 
Picnic Day.  Already I began to experience the fellowship 
and friendship of the Cal Band, camaraderie among the other 
bandsmen.  Of course they were all men in those days.  We 
had a good fellowship and a good camaraderie.  I enjoyed the 
Band.

Dan:  All this happened in the "off season."  Tell us now 
what it was like to have a football band rehearsal - where 
did you do it, who was the drum major, some of the 
mechanics, and what went on in a football band rehearsal.

Bill:  The football band started with the opening of the 
fall semester, probably the end of August.  We also 
rehearsed twice a week, Tuesday and Thursday afternoon from 
4:30 to 6:00.  Usually these were playing rehearsals in room 
175 in the men's gym, except the week before the football 
game we would have one marching rehearsal, usually up at the 
stadium.  The stadium would be open to us, and the sophomore 
and junior managers would bring a PA system for the Student 
Director and Drum Major to use directing and rehearsing the 
stunt.  The stunts were much simpler in those days than what 
they do today.  We would spell out C-A-L, or if were playing 
Santa Clara, we would spell out an S-C.  One time, 
California played Navy and we made the shape of ship, we 
marched in the form of a ship going down the field looking 
like a naval vessel for the Cal-Navy game.  I don't remember 
who was the drum major in the fall of 1942, but I was 
already a sophomore manager.  I'd had a Spring semester and 
eight weeks of summer school, so they let me apply for 
sophomore manager.  Herb Towler was also one of the 
sophomore managers.  There were either three or four 
sophomore managers.  I remember Gordon Goff was the senior 
manager.  I forget who the junior managers were in the fall 
of 1942.  We made the trip to UCLA or USC, whichever game 
was played at the Coliseum that year.  We went by special 
train, a rooters train. The Cal Band having a sleeping car, 
as the rooters sitting up in chair cars.  We stayed at the 
Figueroa hotel near the Coliseum on Figueroa Street in Los 
Angeles.  Chris Tellefsen always went along on these trips, 
and he helped to orient the new band members and make sure 
the uniforms and everything were in proper shape.  He was 
the one who made the arrangements with the hotel because he 
knew the manager very well, and Chris was always a part of 
our Band trips.  A real friend, and a father or grandfather 
to all of us in the Cal Band.

Dan:  Tell us something about the uniforms you were wearing 
and some of the mechanics of the rehearsal.  I'm sure you 
didn't have stunt sheets in those days so somehow the drum 
major had to tell you where to go.  I have recollections for 
example, that the drum major would grab you by the shoulder 
and place you in a certain place and say "This is where you 
should stand." 


Bill:  I recall for the marching rehearsals we would meet 
first in the rehearsal hall. The drum major would outline 
the stunt on the blackboard, showing where the different 
positions would be.  Then as Dan said, as we got to the 
stadium, he would say "Trombones, line up along the 40 yard 
line" and "Trumpets on the 50," showing where the different 
ones would be.  If we were performing a ship or were 
performing spelling a letter, he would assign us where to 
go.  Of course we were playing music when we went into the 
different formations.

Dan:  I want to go back to 1937 for a moment.  The Blue and 
Gold [1937 Blue and Gold, page 233. - NHC]  that year 
mentions a special stunt that the Band did.  Can you 
describe it to us as told to you by your brother.

Bill:  The 1937 Big Game was played at Berkeley.  Cal of 
course hoped to win and regain the Axe.  So the half time 
stunt that the Band worked out, as my brother told me and 
the Blue and Gold describes it, the Bandsmen lay down their 
instruments and hats in the form of an axe and then they 
spelled out the letters "We want the Axe now." They spelled 
out the letters, and it was the first time they had ever 
done such a complicated stunt as spelling out so many 
different words.  I don't remember who won the game though!  
The Blue and Gold would tell!

Dan:  Could you describe to us the uniforms you wore the 
first two years you were in Band?

Bill:  The Band uniform in 1942 was a medium blue coat and 
pants with a dark blue stripe down the pants and I think a 
gold stripe on the bottom of the sleeve, gold buttons, and a 
brown leather Sam Browne belt, blue necktie, and the hat was 
yellow with a "C" on the top of it and a blue band with gold 
ribbon and a white visor.  We wore white shoes.  I'm looking 
at a picture of myself in the spring of 1942.  I think these 
were fairly new uniforms, because when my brother was in the 
Band in the late 30's, he graduated in '39, they had white 
pants and blue coats and Sam Browne belts. So I think these 
were probably new in '40 or '41.  

Dan:  Do you recognize the name Marv Colton?  Can you tell 
us about him?

Bill:  Marv was the senior manager as I recall.  Gordon Goff 
must have been the manager in the spring of that year when I 
was a freshman.  Now that I'm a sophomore, in the fall of 
'42 Marv Colton was the manager.  A little short man, heavy 
set from Southern California.  Very good organizer.  I don't 
remember any jokes about him.

Dan:  Do you recognize the name Al Marin?

Bill:  Alcide Marin was a member of the Band in the fall of 
'42.  He was a music major, and he stayed around Berkeley.  
I've seen him recently - he was at the Spring Concert this 
last spring up in the Hertz Hall of Music.  

Dick Auslen was in the band that year.  He must have been a 
sophomore or junior.  He came back after the war in 1946, 
and he was senior manager.  

Alfred Solomon was in the band.  He, like me, was the son of 
a French professor.  

Ben Scribner was in that band, a tuba player.  He came back 
after the war and was drum major in 1947, the year that I 
was senior manager.  [That was the first year that Dan 
Cheatham was waterboy for the Band. - NHC]

Dan:  Bill, one of the things the current bandsmen don't 
have any first-hand memory of is 5 Eshleman, which was a 
long time home of the Cal Band prior to moving to its 
current quarters.  Do you have any anecdotes, insights, 
recollections, with regard to this former band room.

Bill:  The band room in room 5 of Eshleman Hall was in the 
basement of the old Eshleman Hall.  It was in the south end 
of the building.  It had windows on three sides, one faced 
on the lower Eshleman court, the south window faced on 
Strawberry Creek, and the west window looked toward the 
heating plant [Now called the "Bike Bureau" Building.  It is 
currently used by the Campus Police as the place to register 
bicycles.  Yes, this building was used long ago for the 
generation of steam that was piped throughout the campus 
buildings to supply the steam heating radiators in each 
room.  Centralized steam heating was once state-of-the-art. 
- NHC], I guess, the University heating plant which also was 
the Pelican building.  You came into this room and 
everything was concrete.  It was the basement, so it was 
built of poured concrete. Very noisy, concrete floors, 
walls, ceiling.  Loud echoes.  About twenty feet into the 
room was a ping pong table, and usually a ping pong game 
going on there.  Each side of the table where the players 
stand, the wood had been knocked out by people hitting their 
paddles against it when they were angry.  They just knocked 
the plywood into a little groove there from angry beating of 
the table.  In the corner of the band room as you came in 
the door and turn to the left was an old wooden desk and 
chair and old fashioned telephone up on the wall which was 
used to connect us to the ASUC switchboard.  About thirty 
feet into the room, rows of lockers began and there were 
four or five rows of lockers, double high, each about four 
or five feet high, a lower row and an upper row.  Each 
bandsman had a locker to keep his uniform and instrument in 
it.  Along the north wall which backed up against the 
uniform room, were very large lockers which would hold a 
sousaphone.  At the very back of the band room on the far 
right behind these very large sousaphone lockers was the 
men's room, which was a completely tiled bathroom with 
toilets, urinals and showers and sometimes we would take 
showers there after the game and so forth.  I remember Mr. 
Cushing giving tryouts in the locker room for the football 
band in the fall.  We'd hear him in there trying out 
players.  Also the drummers would go back there and practice 
their drum beats in the echoing, tiled bathroom at the back 
of 5 Eshleman Hall.  [This is identical to Room 5 Eshleman 
Hall in 1954, except that there were no showers.  The shower 
room was now used for music storage. - PB (paraphrased by 
Tim Castro)]

Dan:  Do you have any other recollections of room 5?

Bill:  It was very sparsely furnished other than the desk 
and chair for the band manager to sit at when he was using 
the telephone or doing paperwork, and the ping-pong table. 
There were one or two old leather couches which looked like 
they may have been discarded from a fraternity house.  Those 
were about the only chairs to sit on.  Oh, there was a 
bridge table, and very often a bridge game was going on.  
When my brother was in the Band from '35 to '39 there was a 
continual bridge game going on in the band room, and people 
would play bridge and Ed would have to go to class, and 
someone would take his place and take over his hand.  It was 
called "Band Room Bridge," the very roughest kind of a 
bridge game.  They didn't follow all of the niceties of 
Culbertson.  On the walls were sometimes Berkeley Police 
Department signs, that had been brought home from Big Game 
Rallies.  Other times people would bring home "No Parking" 
signs, a "Street Closed" sign or "Danger Do Not Enter." And 
quite a few of these signs were around the Band Room as 
souvenirs of the trips that the Band had taken.  These 
decorated some of the walls.

[Sometimes we were rather a disrespectful crew, gathering 
street signs, and making fun of the police.  A favorite 
joke, when we saw a policeman, was to yell, "Hey Bill, what 
does your father do for a living?"  And another bandsman 
would reply, "Nothing, he's a cop--ha ha ha!  Another 
favorite joke [When a policeman was within hearing - NHC] 
was "What are pennies made of?" and the reply was "Copper!!" 
[In reference to a common nickname for a policeman - NHC] - 
BF]

Dan:  For the record, in the '48  Blue and Gold, on page 
207, is a photograph showing some of those signs.  In the 
upper left hand corner is Bob Desky playing the trumpet. On 
the very left playing the trombone is Bill Fay.  Bill thinks 
that the person playing the clarinet in the middle is Jim 
Hokanson.

Could you tell us a little bit about the bonfire rallies in 
the Greek Theater during this period before you went off to 
the War.

Bill:  Before each home football game, at least the more 
principal games, there would be a rally in the Greek Theater 
on Thursday or Friday night prior to the game.  Always there 
was a bonfire, and the cry would be "Freshman More Wood!"  
[Dan remembers it as, "Hey Freshman!  More wood!"  In those 
days the bonfire had railroad ties stacked, log-cabin style, 
in a rough circle, 10-15 feet high.  All sorts of 
combustibles were tossed inside.  It made a long-burning 
fire.  Today's fire is made from shipping pallets.  They are 
a lighter fuel and the fire doesn't burn as long. - NHC]  
The freshmen were required to bring more wood and throw it 
on the fire to keep it going.  One of these rallies, usually 
for USC or UCLA game, was called the "pajamarino rally" and 
people would put their pajamas on over their clothes and 
everybody came in pajamas. I don't know the history of this, 
but it goes way back.  Even the Blue and Gold's from the 
1920's show pajamarino rallies taking place, so I know it's 
a very old custom to wear pajamas.  At the rallies, the 
football team would be introduced and we'd cheer for each 
member of the team.  The yell leaders would lead 
yells..."Coach Stub Allison, rah, rah, rah...rah, rah, rah, 
Coach Stub Allison, Yeah."  [During Pappy Waldorf's time, 
there was a special coach's yell that was given in the third 
quarter.  It went, "Coach...  Coach Pappy...  Coach Pappy 
Waldorf...  Rah!...  Rah, Rah!...  Coach Pappy Waldorf...  
Rah, Rah, Rah!  (Notice that it is a variation on the split-
six yell.) - NHC]   The Cal Band would play fight songs, and 
the students would fill the upper part of the Greek Theater 
and sing Cal songs and join in the yells and the cheers for 
the players and for the coaches.  Big crowds came to the 
rallies, they were very well attended.  Greek Theater might 
have a thousand or two thousand people in it at some of 
these rallies.  Stub Allison was the football coach during 
the late 30's.  He took the Rose Bowl team in 1938.  He was 
still the coach in the fall of '42 when I was a sophomore 
manager, and then he must have been fired or retired after 
that.  During the War years of '43 to '46, Frank Wickhorst 
who had been a Navy instructor of the V-12 program was the 
coach.  He was still the coach in the fall of '46.   It was 
a very bad season, and Frank Wickhorst was run out of town 
at the end of that season.

Dan:  Today's Band doesn't do much with regard to street 
marching.  How was it in your Band?

Bill:  Yes, the University used to have a parade during 
Homecoming time, either UCLA or Stanford game.  It was held 
on Friday afternoon, the day before the game. The Cal Band 
would lead a parade down Shattuck Avenue starting at 
Shattuck and Vine all the way down to Shattuck and 
University and then up University Avenue to the campus.  
Behind the Band would be various floats and different parade 
entries.  The fraternities would build floats, sometimes 
rather vulgar [Using anti-Stanford themes. - NHC], with 
bathtubs on them or toilet bowls, and people taking a bath.  
The sorority floats were rather attractive with flowers and 
nice decorations, and the girls wearing pretty dresses.  The 
City of Berkeley really turned out in good support of these 
parades, and there was a very good feeling of cooperation 
between the City and the University in those days.  People 
really supported the University.  People gave a lot of 
enthusiasm and interest in these parades and what was 
happening up on the Berkeley campus.  

The Band didn't march as fast as they do now.  [I think Bill 
is referring to the present "tunnel flow" wherein the Band 
enters the field from the North Tunnel at an extremely fast 
pace (240 beats/minute).-NHC]  We went maybe about 160 beats 
to the minute.  180 would be the very fastest that we went.  
I think they go faster than that now. Of course a military 
band marches at 120 beats to the minute, we never went as 
slow as that.  It was kind of a shuffling step, when you're 
walking 160 or 180 beats to the minute you're taking small 
steps and very short ones.  It does wear out the soles of 
the shoes.  We wore white shoes in the Band, and these were 
often very cheap white, not canvas, but very cheap leather 
shoes and not very comfortable.  I remember my white shoes I 
used to wear, I had kind of a liquid chalky polish I would 
put on them before the game to make them nice, but next week 
they would have to be polished all over again because the 
white chalk polish wore off.

Dan:  Today's Band has a number of different drum beats that 
go with the slower pace of 120.  [As an interlude to the 
faster tempo "High Step."]  In fact I think they have 4, 5 
or 6 different drum beats.  In your day I recollect there 
was only one drum beat.  Does that mean you would march the 
whole parade at that tempo and that one drum beat?  

Bill:  We marched the whole parade at 160 or 180 steps to 
the minute.  They were short steps so that the people behind 
us could keep up, but it was a very snappy band. All our 
stunts at the half time and the marching before and after 
the game was always done at this fast stepping pace.  The 
Cal Band marched faster than any of the other bands.  
Stanford, USC, UCLA, they didn't march as fast as we did.  
It was quite a tradition in the Cal Band that we marched at 
a fast cadence.

Dan:  That's amazing because you should hear the kids today 
moan and groan about being worn out and too tired to march 
the full distance between the stadium and the Band Room at 
that pace.  That must mean you guys were supermen in those 
days.  We did it too and I'd like to think we were.  In my 
day when I was a marching member, I recollect the emotional 
and uplifting effect that the drum beat would have on us 
because we too only had the single drum beat.  It was "our" 
Drum Beat and we were proud of it.  Did your band experience 
anything similar?

Bill:  Yes.  The drum beat really inspired the Band.  Da da 
da daa, da da daa, etc.... Dan said that Charles Cushing was 
the one who originated this drum beat and it was the only 
drum beat that we used.  We only had that one drum beat, and 
once the drum beat started, everyone was enthusiastic and we 
marched right off all together at the same beat.  It was a 
real thrill to march in the Cal Band.

Dan:  With the faster tempo of the Cal Band, what influence 
did this have when you were appearing in parades with other 
bands?

Bill:  Using the fast drum beat kind of gave us a special 
esprit de corps, and we were proud of our drum beat.  If we 
were in a parade with other bands that used 120 cadence we 
were glad to show them up, that we could go faster than they 
did and we played better than they did.  There was a real 
feeling that the Cal Band was the best. We would go 160 or 
180, and we were proud of this.  If it confused the other 
bands, too bad for them.

Dan:  In my day the drum section would make a special effort 
whenever they were in hearing distance of another band to 
sort of close off their ears to the other tempo and they 
would play extra loud and take pride in trying to force the 
other band to break its step.  That was a source of pride 
for our band.

I'd like to take a few moments to talk about the rooting 
section during the game before the time you went off to the 
war.  

Bill:  The rooting section in 1942 was segregated.  The 
men's rooting section was about maybe about from the 40 yard 
line to the 40 yard line.  The women sat from the 40 yard 
line down to the 30 yard line on either side.  But the men's 
rooting section was the principal rooting section.  On the 
benches was marked the letter "C" in blue many feet high so 
that when you sat across from the stadium you could see this 
"C" outlined in the middle of the men's rooting section.  
The rooters all wore caps in those days, and they were 
reversible.  One side was blue and one side was gold.  
[Also, everybody wore white shirts. - NHC]  If you sat in 
the center section where it was blue, you wore the blue side 
out of your cap.  If you were sitting around it for the 
background of the "C" you wore the yellow side out.  When 
the rooters came to the game they found a stack of cards at 
each place, maybe 6 or 8 colored cards, blue, yellow, red, 
orange, green.  Also a mimeograph sheet with numbers on it 
telling what number card you would hold up at face level for 
each of the stunts.  The yell leader would call out "number 
1" and you would all hold up your number 1 card, which would 
maybe show a picture of an $C for Southern Cal.  One of the 
most complicated stunts that we worked out was to show the 
half time score.  This had to be done very carefully - so it 
would show "Cal 14, USC 10".  This would work out ahead of 
time so people would hold up the right color card to spell 
"Cal 14, USC 10" at the half time.  We would also have 
pictures of Oski which would be held up in different color 
cards.  Pictures of a Stanford Indian, for UCLA a little 
baby bruin. These colored cards would be very colorful, and 
there would be maybe 10 or 12 different numbers called out 
and the picture would change each time a different number 
was called, you'd hold up a different card according to the 
mimeographed sheet in front of you telling what card to hold 
for each number.  At the end of the card stunts, everyone 
would throw the cards up into the air and a great whirlwind 
of cards, all the cards spinning up in the air over and over 
and over, and it was very beautiful to see all these colored 
cards whirling in the air as people sailed them into air at 
the end of the card stunt.  [Rally Committee really hates 
this because the cards would get ruined and because they 
were hard to collect and reuse on the following Saturday. - 
NHC]  The stunts would last maybe about no more than 5 or 6 
minutes.  This went on during the same time as the bands 
were performing down on the field. Usually the visiting band 
would have the first 10 minutes and the Cal Band the second 
10 minutes of the half time, and the card stunts went on 
simultaneously with the band performances.  They weren't 
always coordinated, the card stunts weren't necessarily 
related to what the band was doing on the field.  [The 
benches were wooden and you could thumbtack the cards and 
the instruction sheet onto the seats so they would be in 
place when the rooters got there.  Now the seats are metal 
and they have to tape a paper bag containing the cards and 
instructions to the seats.  The rooting sections faced each 
other across the 50 yard line and yelled insults at each 
other.  Often the opposing rooting section would do card 
stunts too. - NHC]

Dan:  Tell me about Clifton's cafeteria.

Bill:  Clifton's cafeteria was a downtown restaurant in Los 
Angeles where California Alumni would always have a luncheon 
prior the USC or UCLA game, and the Cal Band would always 
come and play for the luncheon before going to the stadium 
for the game.  It was a very elaborate restaurant with all 
kinds of palm trees and different potted trees around the 
dining room.  There were waterfalls coming down one of the 
walls, and the place was just packed with California Alumni 
having lunch before the game.  The Band would come marching 
in there, we would march in from the buses which were parked 
on the street.  We would form up on the sidewalk and march 
in playing the Lights Out March, Our Sturdy Golden Bear.  We 
would play two or three songs.  Some yell leaders would be 
there and they would lead some Cal yells.  We never ate 
lunch there, the Cal Band didn't get lunch, but we would 
play to entertain the people who were having their lunch.  I 
think the Band had a sack lunch probably the day of the game 
and probably ate it on the bus going to the Coliseum.

Dan:  In my day, I recollect that the Band would stop at 
Pershing Square and form up in front of the Biltmore Hotel 
and play a song or two and then march the two or three 
blocks to Clifton's.  In our case we actually got to eat 
there.  They gave us free lunch in exchange for drawing a 
crowd in.  

During the period before you went to the War, would you 
describe what it was like when the game was over.  Describe 
the sequence of events after a football game.

Bill:  After the game was over, the yell leaders would shout 
"Stick around for `All Hail´", and we'd always sing "All 
Hail" in the stands before going down to the field.  The 
rooters and the Band together would do "All Hail".  Then 
immediately the Band would form up at the foot of the 
rooting section on the field, and if Cal was the winning 
team, the Band would march across the field to the opposing 
side and everyone streamed onto the field in those days, 
there were no security guards to keep people off, the whole 
audience would go down to the field.  When I was in high 
school and junior high I would run behind the Band across 
the field and follow them over to the other side. We'd walk 
across and serenade the losing team.  If Cal lost the game, 
the visiting team and visiting band, if there was a visiting 
band, would march across to the Cal side and we'd stay in 
the stand and they would serenade us.  We'd have a little 
concert.  After the two or three songs of this serenade, the 
Band would form up and march out of the stadium toward the 
north tunnel playing; as we got close to the tunnel we'd 
play "One More River".  (Bill Fay now sings One More River.)

"One More River"

The ships go sailing down the bay,
There's one more river to cross;
We may not meet for many a day,
There's one more river to cross.
One more river,
And that's the River Jordan
One more river,
There's one more river to cross.

The animals came two by two
There's one more river to cross;
The elephants and kangaroos,
There's one more river to cross.
One more river,
And that's the River Jordan
One more river,
There's one more river to cross.

[The references are mixed here--The Israelites crossing the 
Red Sea and the Jordan River; and Noah leading the animals 
into the Ark.  For Cal, "One more river" means one more 
football game to go.  The Band always switches from "One 
More River" to "One Balled Reilly" about halfway through the 
Tunnel--I don't know how this tradition started, but they 
still do it today!! - BF]

The trombones really slurred that one part, and about half 
way into the tunnel we would change from One More River to 
One Balled Reilly.  (He sings this now.)  We'd do One Balled 
Reilly coming out of the tunnel and as soon as we got out of 
the tunnel we'd form under the windows of the training room 
outside [on] the north side of the stadium and the coach 
would come out and speak to the crowd.  Stub Allison and 
later Frank Wickhorst, and later after the War when Pappy 
Waldorf came he would do this.  If Cal had won the game, he 
would give a wonderful victory cheer, and the cheerleaders 
would yell "Coach Stub Allison, rah, rah, rah, let's give 
Coach Stub Allison a big 12 cheer".  We'd give him 12 rahs. 
If Cal had won, he'd introduce two or three players that 
really had a great day, like Vic Bottari in 1938 All 
American, some of the other great players would come out on 
the balcony and they would speak to us.  Vic Bottari was a 
one of the great Cal players of all time.  He was a half 
back in 1938 on the Rose Bowl team.  "Vallejo Vic" was his 
nickname, because he came from the town of Vallejo just at 
the end of the Carquinez Bridge.  He was one of the most 
popular players.  I think his number was 98.  [When the team 
won, "Pappy" would bring out one or two players.  If the 
team lost, "Pappy" would come out alone and face the 
rooters, taking full blame for the loss. - NHC]

Going back to Room 5, past Bowles Hall and there was a road 
right opposite Bowles Hall between the Faculty Club and 
Senior Mens Hall on the left, and the Physics building, 
LeConte Hall, on the right, and we'd go right down that 
street below Bowles Hall north of Cowell Hospital, to the 
Eshleman Court and down to Room 5 at Eshleman Hall.  Not 
quite such a long trip as they do now going down Bancroft 
Way. 

Dan:  So now we're back to the period of time when you went 
off to war.  You've already described some of your 
adventures during the War, but can you tell us about the 
actual event of your getting notified that you had to go.  
What events do you recollect?

Bill:  About the 15th of March, 1943, the government decided 
to end the Enlisted Reserve Program, which several hundred 
students had signed up for.  The government decided to put 
an end to this and put us into active duty because the War 
in Africa was ending and they were getting ready to start 
the invasion of Italy and more soldiers were needed.  So we 
were put into active duty.  The Daily Californian about the 
15th of March listed 300 students by name, those that were 
to go on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of the third week in 
March.  One hundred students each day saw their names in the 
Daily Cal and knew it was time to go.  We had to report to 
Third and Townsend station in San Francisco to board the 
troop train for Monterey.  Dean Stone as I think mentioned 
came and said good-bye to all the students on the train 
before it pulled out for the Presidio in Monterey. It was 
about six or eight weeks into the spring semester so we 
didn't get any credit at all for that term because we had 
just had the first mid-term period, so we didn't get any 
credit for the spring semester.  

Dan:  OK, now we're at the point, where you're coming back 
to campus after this recess of several years.  What were 
your first reactions to the campus during this period?

Bill:  I came back to the campus in the fall of 1946 after 
being away three and half years in the Army.  First of all, 
it was very good to be back.  We were happy the War was 
over.  Many, many veterans were on the campus by this time.  
Almost everybody who was in the Army or Navy was discharged 
by now, and there were many more men on campus than there 
had been during the War.  Most of the men were V-12 or the 
few ROTCs that stayed on the campus.  Very few civilian men.  
But in the fall of '46, a great rush of veterans.  Most of 
us had the GI bill which gave us $75 a month plus paying our 
tuition and books and such, so it was a really good deal for 
the veterans that we had most of our expenses paid.  The 
campus was very lively, very enthusiastic, very glad to have 
the war over.  Of course the war had ended earlier, the war 
ended in September 1945, but it took a long time for men to 
be mustered out of the service and probably the fall of '46 
was the first real post-war class to begin to come back to 
college.  The campus was very crowded, 28,000 students in 
1946.  Great enthusiasm. I remember I still had my Army 
uniform, so I'd wear khakis or green pants or dress pinks.  
As an officer I had dress greens and dress pinks and the 
khakis for summer wear, these were the clothes that I wore, 
very often khaki shirts that I had left over from my Army 
uniforms.  A lot of students were wearing their old Army 
clothes. Fatigue jacket.  [The thought of a pink army 
uniform sounds silly, but actually it was an off-color tan 
with a slight "blush" to it.  The V-12 Program was a special 
Navy program based at International House. - NHC]

Dan:  During the period you were gone, there was a shortage 
of people to play in the Band.  Do you have any 
recollections or insight as to how the Band survived during 
that period? 

Bill:  Well, I've been told that the campus was quite 
austere during the years 1943 to 1946 when most of the men 
students were away in the service except for those who were 
assigned to study at Cal in the Navy V-12 program, or OCS 
[Officers Candidate School - NHC] program or different 
officer training programs.  [These were accelerated college 
education programs resulting in a degree and a commission. - 
NHC]  Those people in the military programs were very 
severely regimented.  My brother-in-law went through college 
in two and a half years.  Straight around the clock, twelve 
months a year, he got his degree in two and a half years and 
went right to the Pacific as an Ensign in the Navy.  Most of 
the men who were on campus were in this kind of program.  
The Band, I think, barely survived because there were very 
few civilian men on campus.  One of my friends said that he 
was the senior manager, the drum major and the student 
director, all three, during one of those war years because 
there weren't very many men on campus.  So I think Professor 
Cushing must have been delighted when the War was over in 
1946 and he could really recruit a full size band again, and 
he could really get out a great band.  I should say that the 
Cal Band is unique among college bands in that it's student 
organized.  It's always been a student run organization ever 
since the 1920's.  The students elect their own officers, 
they elect an Executive Committee, and the Executive 
Committee then appoints the senior manager, the drum major 
and the student director.  I think the junior and sophomore 
managers and librarians, secretaries, are elected by the 
members of the Band.

Dan:  So now we're at the point where you've returned.  Your 
memories must have turned to the Cal Band and to reentering 
and carrying on as it was before you left for the War.

Bill:  I was very glad to get back to the Cal Band and see 
old friends that I hadn't seen for three or four years.   
Having been a sophomore manager when I was called into the 
military service in 1943, I was now qualified to be a junior 
manager.  Dave Wenrich and I were the two junior managers in 
1946/47 year.  Dick Auslen was the senior manager, I'd known 
him before the War.  He also was away for military service 
and had come back again and was the senior manager.

Dan:  Well, somehow you guys had to re-institute the Band.  
Do you have any anecdotes to tell about that?

Bill:  Two classes of people came into the Band in '46, 
those of us that who had been in the Band for a year or two 
before the war and on the other hand those who were incoming 
freshman who had just finished high school.  So there was 
really two groups of people in the Band, the returning 
veterans and the brand new recruits.  The Band advertised 
for people to come tryout and to join up, and we had plenty 
of people.  We put out a full band in 1946.  I think we had 
120 or 140 in the 1946 band.  We found the same uniforms we 
had worn in 1942, this was the last year they were used.  We 
bought new uniforms before the '47 season.  They had mustard 
colored pants, and President Sproul joked about the mustard 
color of the pants.  They were not very popular, blue coats 
and mustard pants.  But in '46 we had the old 1942 uniforms 
which were blue with a leather Sam Browne belt.  Dick 
Auslen, senior manager, the band officers in '46 were Russ 
Green the drum major, and LeRoy Klekamp the student 
director.  All three of these had been in the Band before 
the War, and those of us who were former bandsmen really 
took it upon ourselves to train the new bandsmen to show 
them how to march and teach them some of the Cal Band 
traditions, some of the songs that we sang on bus trips that 
we always sang on the bus.  One of my favorite songs was 
about Tiny Thornhill [The song "Cardinals Be Damned" always 
substitutes the name of the current Stanford coach in the 
first line of the first verse. - NHC], the coach at 
Stanford.

Dan:  You were in a position to pass on some of the 
traditions that were broken. Some of the names of the songs 
for example were the "Cardinals be Damned", the "One Balled 
Reilly".  Those are the only ones that I'm willing to put on 
tape.  So time has come now for you to perform for the first 
time in the post war band.  Do you have any thoughts or 
recollections on those early performances?

Bill:  We worked hard on our stunts.  The Executive 
Committee usually planned the stunts and they would figure 
what we would do at half time and then they would give it to 
us at the Tuesday and Thursday rehearsal.  We'd actually 
practice the marching of the stunt at the Thursday rehearsal 
and again on Saturday morning before going up to the 
stadium.  Generally there was a feeling of pleasure and joy, 
it was great to be back at college again, we had all these 
new young guys that were very enthusiastic freshman.  Most 
of them had played in their high school bands in Willows, 
Sacramento, Fresno, Los Banos, Reedley, all the different 
little towns that sent people to Cal.  In those days it was 
easier to get into Cal.  Anyone with a "B" average in high 
school was admitted to the University of California.  We had 
many people from very small high schools, but they all had 
experience in their high school bands.  They brought their 
enthusiasm with them, and we tried to be contagious with the 
Cal Band tradition and the Cal Band enthusiasm.  It was 
really a great year in 1946, a great year in the Band, great 
spirit.

Dan:  I'm going to ask you about a couple names here.  Could 
you give a few paragraphs on who these people were.  These 
are people who later went on to be very important to the 
Band.

What are your first recollections and any anecdotes or 
insights on Bob Desky?

Bill:  Bob Desky was one of the people I first remember in 
the fall of 1946.  He was probably a freshman or sophomore 
that year, coming from Lowell High School in San Francisco, 
and a very prominent San Francisco family.  Desky was very 
loud, very jolly, he loved to tell jokes.  One of the jokes 
that he told proved that he was very thrifty with pennies, 
and so we used to say "Don't take any wooden nickels, 
Desky", and so he got the nickname of Wooden Nickel Desky 
because he was very tight with his money.  He was a real 
good spirit, and really got into the enthusiasm.  He loved 
to sing, and make jokes.  Just an all around good fellow in 
the Band.

Dan:  The next person I want to ask you about is Bill 
Ellsworth.

Bill:  Bill Ellsworth was a saxophone player from Compton, 
down in Southern California.  He really had an awful lot of 
enthusiasm.  Anything that the Band was doing, Bill 
Ellsworth was there.  If they asked for a small group to 
sign up to play for a basketball game or a hockey game down 
at the Iceland ice rink, Bill Ellsworth was always there.  
He loved to take part in everything, he was really the 
bandsman par excellence.  Bill Ellsworth had a real 
enthusiasm and real spirit of the Cal Band.  He again was a 
freshman or sophomore in '46.  I forget whether they entered 
that year or the year before.  Bill Ellsworth was the one 
who really picked up Cal Band traditions, and was very 
enthusiastic for all of the life.  He loved the parties, he 
loved to go get a beer after the basketball game or when we 
finished a band trip he always wanted to party and just 
celebrate the joy of existence.  A very happy fellow, Bill 
Ellsworth.  [For the historical record: Bill Fay confirms 
that Bill Ellsworth was not doing his saxophone-playing/soft 
shoe dance during the years that Fay was in the Band. - NHC]

Dan:  Now we're at the time where you become senior manager 
of the Band.  Would you give us your recollections of your 
assumptions of these duties?

Bill:  The senior manager was appointed by the Executive 
Committee, which consisted of Professor Cushing, the 
outgoing senior manager, the outgoing drum major and the 
outgoing student director, and the rep-at-large.  These five 
people were the Executive Committee and they appointed me to 
be senior manager for the '47/48 year.  I was very pleased 
with this.  Two compensations were given to the senior 
manager.  I was paid $25 a semester by the ASUC for my 
expenses and was given two complimentary tickets for each 
football game which I could give to my family or whoever I 
wanted to. As senior manager I had to help the librarian 
make sure the rehearsal hall was set up for our playing 
rehearsal in 175 Men's Gym.  I'd get there ahead of time and 
put out the chairs and music stands and the librarian would 
put out the music.  I think Huntley Johnson [Now a Dentist 
across the street from Alta Bates Hospital in the "Huntmont 
Building".  Huntley and Jerry Patmont, M.D., Cal Team 
Physician, were partners in constructing that building on 
the site of Huntley's family home. - NHC]  was the librarian 
during my senior year.  I also had to make announcements at 
the end of rehearsal.  Professor Cushing would say "Bill, do 
you have any announcements?" and as senior manager, the band 
would sing "God damn our manager, God damn our manager, God 
damn his hide," [To the tune of "God Save The Queen." - NHC] 
and I'd be going up to the podium to make the announcements 
for the week, details about the coming football game.  I 
remember particularly the day we were getting on the train 
to go to Los Angeles for the USC game.  I'd already posted 
in the band room the list of assignments on the rooter 
train, who would be sharing each compartment of the train.  
We had open section sleeping cars, so everyone had either an 
upper or lower berth.  There was one compartment of three 
berths and a private compartment at each end, each car had a 
private compartment.  I assigned myself one of these 
compartments with Bob Barton, who was a special buddy of 
mine and we had the compartment at the end of the train. I 
made these announcements, that everyone be down at the 
University Avenue station at 6:00, because the train leaves 
promptly at 6:30.  Everyone had to get themselves down there 
either by bus or streetcar or have their friends drive them 
down and drop them off.  Mr. Cushing smiled through all of 
this as I made the announcements.  The people laughing and 
joking, just the excitement of the trip coming was a real 
feeling of excitement.  Previously I had made arrangements 
with the Pulman Company to have three sleeping cars on the 
train.  I did this all by telephone.  Arranged for charter 
buses to be on hand in Los Angeles to meet the train and 
take us to the hotel, and to take us out UCLA if it was a 
UCLA University meeting that we played for the day before 
the game.  And buses to take us to the appropriate hotels 
for the luncheon meeting before the game and so on.  The 
Figueroa hotel, which was run by a friend of Chris 
Tellefsen.  Chris was friend of the manager and helped with 
a lot of these arrangements.  I might also say that Chris 
Tellefsen also was in charge of caps and gowns for ASUC, and 
in the big storeroom next to room 5, we stored the band 
uniforms and also the caps and gowns were stored there.  
[The ASUC rented caps and gowns to graduating Seniors to use 
for the graduation ceremony.  There was one massive ceremony 
held in the stadium. - NHC]  Chris' special job was to be 
the cap and gown manager and the uniform manager, and so he 
was very much involved with the Band and went on all of the 
trips with us and always took part in the drinking parties.  
If we had a drinking party at a bar in the evening, Chris 
was often a part of this and just a great friend to all of 
us.  The Figueroa hotel was on Figueroa Boulevard, which is 
a main north-south street from downtown Los Angeles going 
south toward the USC campus and the Coliseum, and the 
Figueroa hotel was on the Boulevard a few blocks away.

Dan:  How did you guys treat the hotel, what was your 
behavior like?

Bill:  The bandsmen had parties in their room in the 
evening, and I think the hotel was not any better for wear 
when we left.  Probably the manager and housekeeping staff 
were glad to see us go.  We would hang out the windows and 
shout to the girls walking by on the street down below.  
Just pretty much rowdy boys, a lot of us as I had said were 
war veterans and we'd traveled around the world and had a 
lot of experiences and thought we were pretty great and 
didn't mind showing off and having a loud, good time.

Dan:  Do you have any additional recollections of events 
regarding the rooters train?

Bill:  If the game was at USC, the Band would make the trip 
down on Friday night and arrive Saturday morning in time to 
have a rehearsal at Bovard field and play at the game.  
Saturday night and Sunday were free until 5:00 Sunday 
afternoon when we were to meet back at Union Station for the 
return to Berkeley.  I remember the bandsmen gathering 
there, and some of us got there early and had a drink or two 
in the bar before getting on the train.  As we got on the 
train and looked out of the window, there was Professor 
Cushing with Igor Stravinsky, who was a friend of Cushing's 
and lived in Westwood.  Cushing had gone to visit him for 
the Saturday night after the game, and Stravinsky brought 
Cushing back to Union Station to put him on the train. We 
were much impressed to see the great composer with our band 
leader before the train started back to Berkeley.

Dan:  Back to the subject of rowdyism for just a moment.  I 
seem to recollect that there was a particularly rowdy member 
by the name of Bill Fay.  There was one particular event 
which was famous in your life to the point that you used to 
carry around a newspaper clipping in your wallet for a long 
time.  Can you tell us about that?

Bill:  The clipping was from the Oakland Tribune, and the 
headline was:

 "UC Band Leader Forfeits Bail", Berkeley, California. UC 
Band Leader William M. Fay, son of Professor Percival B. 
Fay, of 955 Mendocino Avenue, was arrested Saturday night 
following impromptu student rallies on the corner of 
Piedmont Avenue and Channing Way.  Fay was involved in a so 
called jeep piloting and musical combination.  He was 
arrested driving a jeep with 14 Bear enthusiasts, and Fay 
was driving the jeep with one hand and playing a trombone 
with the other.  He was cited by a police officer for 
reckless driving and told to return to the police station.  
When Fay failed to heed to the policemen's instructions a 
warrant was issued for his arrest.

That was the extent of the newspaper article.  The following 
Monday night, I was at dinner at my fraternity house and a 
policeman came in and asked the President "Is William Fay 
here?", and he pointed me out sitting at the table, and he 
said "I have a warrant for his arrest".  The Deke brothers 
quickly said "Can we chip together any bail or help you to 
get out of this?"  The officer said "That won't be 
necessary, but he does need to come with me down to the 
police station."  So I went with him to the police station 
and signed a bail certificate for $25 bail, and they said 
"You'll hear later from Judge Oliver Youngs."  As it turned 
out my next door neighbor in Berkeley was William Jenkins, 
Vice President of the Bank of America and a good friend of 
Judge Oliver Youngs.  Mr. Jenkins intervened for me and made 
a phone call to Judge Youngs who agreed that if I forfeited 
the $25 bail, the case would be dropped.  I was happy that 
this was the end of it.  My parents were much embarrassed, 
especially my father who often ate at the faculty club and 
some of his colleagues said "I saw your son William's name 
in the newspaper the other day."  My mother was worried 
about this too, because I had already interviewed with 
Bishop Block about becoming a candidate for the Episcopal 
ministry.  She said "If Bishop Block sees this, do you think 
he'll allow you to go on with your preparation for the 
ministry?"  Fortunately, I don't think the Bishop ever saw 
it!

Dan:  You mentioned the fraternity house and you used the 
word "Deke".  For those readers of this interview who aren't 
aware of it, could you tell us what this stood for and what 
it was all about.

Bill:  I belonged to a college fraternity called Delta Kappa 
Epsilon, which was nicknamed the "Deke" house for our Greek 
letters, Delta-Kappa-Epsilon.  The house was located at the 
corner of Piedmont Avenue and Bancroft Way, right opposite 
from International House, and it's still there to this day.  
I still belong to the fraternity and went to a fraternity 
luncheon in San Francisco just last Monday, of alumni of 
Cal, Stanford and other Bay Area chapters of the fraternity, 
so I'm still active in that fraternity.

Dan:  Tell us what it was like to rehearse under Professor 
Cushing.

Bill:  Mr. Cushing was described by one of the Bay Area 
sports papers as a "bearded, old line musician."  This was 
after the first Rose Bowl game that Cal went to in 1949, and 
the Cal Band was somewhat shown up by the great Northwestern 
band from a Big Ten University.  I think this was the 
beginning of Mr. Cushing's downfall as leader of the Cal 
Band.  He was an excellent musician and a very serious 
conductor.  In the symphonic band he was very careful and 
precise in our rehearsals, that we got all the fine points 
of the music.  A real musician.  He wasn't very much for 
marching bands and stunts and things, and this was left 
pretty much up to the student leadership.  Bob Briggs takes 
much more involvement in the marching and field activities 
than Mr. Cushing ever did.

Dan:  You forgot to mention when you talked about coming out 
of the stadium and going back down to the band room, you 
told us about playing "One More River" but you didn't tell 
us about the "Stanford Waltz".  Can you tell us about that 
now?

Bill:  After we came out of the stadium and were starting 
back to the band room, we did the "Stanford Waltz".  We'd 
play "Come Join the Band" at waltz time...(Bill sings) "Come 
join the band, da da da daaa, and give a cheer for Stanford 
red, throughout the land, our Banner's waving overhead, da 
da da daaa".  And we'd play this in 3/4 time, and we'd waltz 
it.  We didn't march our regular 160 step to the minute for 
the Stanford Waltz.  [The whole block band would do an 
impromptu waltz while playing the tune - NHC]  And we loved 
making fun of the Stanford Band by doing this, the Stanford 
Waltz.  [The gag here is that we were playing Stanford's 
Fight Song in waltz time.  It was always fun to play it in 
the stands when the Stanford rooters could hear it. - NHC]

Dan:  While we're on the subject, can you tell us anything 
about your impressions of the Stanford Band in those days?

Bill:  The Stanford Band in those days wasn't as zany as 
they are today.  They didn't march with the precision and 
excellence that we thought that the Cal Band had, but they 
were fairly military.  They weren't really outstanding in 
any way, nor as crazy as they are today.  Just a second 
class college band is what we'd call the Stanford Band in 
those days.

Dan:  They did march with a military style and a uniform 
that was similar enough to ours.  That was the standard 
college marching band at that time.  

You're holding something in your hand that I'd like you to 
describe. Tell us the importance of it to the University of 
California Marching Band.

Bill:  This is a brochure for Lokoya Boys Camp which was a 
private boys camp up in the Napa redwood [region], 11 miles 
northwest of the City of Napa.  My brother and I both 
attended this camp as campers during the early 1930's, and 
then my brother was a counselor during the years he was in 
college.  And after 4 years as a camper I also went back as 
a counselor for 4 more years, 1941, '42 and again in '47, 
'48.  In 1947, Dick Auslen had just finished his year as 
senior manager of the band, and I was coming in as the new 
senior manager.  Anna Cheatham was the camp nurse, and her 
young son Danny was at camp that summer, probably about 12 
or 11 years old.  Dick Auslen and I being bandsmen brought a 
lot of Cal enthusiasm to camp. We sang Cal the songs and 
taught the campers to sing most of the California fight 
songs.  In the fall I invited Dan if he'd like to be a water 
boy.  In those days we had junior, senior high school age 
water boys who carried water for the band to drink during 
the performance and they also helped with the equipment, 
like the yard markers for the rehearsal field and helping to 
carry equipment we needed for the stunts, any props and so 
on.  So Danny was signed up as a water boy in the fall of 
1947, and this was I think maybe his first association with 
band, a long and distinguished association which goes on to 
this day.

Dan:  Yes, that was the beginning of it all.  I have you to 
thank for it, Bill.  

Would you tell us about Frank Wickhorst?

Bill:  Frank Wickhorst was one of the physical education 
instructors sent to Cal by the Navy during the years of the 
V-12 program, 1943 to '44, '45, when the Navy trained the 
naval officers in Callaghan Hall.  International House was 
taken over as quarters for navy personnel during their pre-
officer training, and Wickhorst was one of their physical 
education instructors.  After Stub Allison had a losing 
season or two and was relieved as football coach, Wickhorst 
became the Cal football coach, probably 1943 to '46.  The 
'46 year was a disastrous season.  I think Cal only won one 
or two football games in '46, and the alumni and faculty 
demanded Wickhorst's removal.  Pappy Waldorf was recruited 
from Northwestern University, and he came in the summer of 
1947 and took over the Cal football team.  As I recall 
Wickhorst had such a bad season in '46 that the students 
became more and more disgusted with him, and after one very 
bad loss the students began tearing up the wooden bleachers 
in the stadium and placing them on the floor of the stadium 
for a bonfire because they were so angry.  It was just a 
terrible student riot.  The students were completely out of 
control, and just destroying the property.  This I think was 
just a symbol of the anger that everyone felt about a bad 
football season.  Later of course there was a meeting of the 
student body and the faculty and Wickhorst was forced to 
resign as football coach.

Dan:  Once or twice in the past here, Bill has referred to 
the V-12 program.  Just for the record, that was a specially 
created program by the navy to train incoming officers, and 
it had a very big presence and influence on the campus 
during a portion of the war years.  Also I'd like to 
comment, Bill mentioned the scene at the train station in 
Los Angeles where they were sitting and having a few drinks 
prior to leaving, coming north.  I would like to point out 
that because of the returning veterans, there was a large 
percentage of the student body that were of legal drinking 
age, not to mention I'm sure a lot of other guys that 
managed to have fake IDs.  But those were very special years 
and a subject for a separate commentary and interview.  
Also, I'd like to add to the commentary that in those days 
Intercollegiate Athletics was in fact owned and run by the 
Associated Students, which meant that the hiring and firing 
of the coaches was a matter of what was then called the 
Executive Committee of the Associated Students, which was 
the governing body of the A.S.U.C., that governing body now 
being referred to as the student senate.  [It was a rowdy 
meeting with angry rooters demanding that Wickhorst be 
fired.  The Daily Cal covered the meeting.  I doubt if there 
has been as contemptuous a firing of an athletic coach.  
I've often wondered about his subsequent career. - NHC]

What are your recollections of the Big Game of 1947.

Bill:  The 1947 Big Game was of course my last game as 
Senior Manager.  It was a fairly even game, back and forth 
between Cal and Stanford.  In the last five minutes or so, 
Stanford was still ahead, and Cal made a wonderful play with 
a long touchdown pass in the closing minutes and won the 
game I think 18-14.  The Band always plays "Our Sturdy 
Golden Bear" whenever Cal makes a touchdown, and I was so 
enthusiastic that as a Senior Manager I took my pencil out 
of my pocket and jumped up on the podium and conducted "Our 
Sturdy Golden Bear".  I had seen Dick Auslen do this the 
year before when he was Senior Manager, and I thought this a 
privilege of the Senior Manager, to conduct the Band one 
time.  So I enjoyed conducting "Our Sturdy Golden Bear" as 
Cal won the 1947 Big Game.

Dan:  Bill, wasn't this also associated with your 
misadventure with the jeep?  Perhaps you could describe to 
us the spirit in the air in Berkeley during special moments 
throughout the football season, such as the Big Game.

Bill:  There was great excitement though the whole week 
before the Big Game.  The Band would go during class time 
through Wheeler Hall, the library, we'd parade down the top 
of the library tables playing Cal fight songs while students 
were trying to do their studies during Big Game week.  
Friday night of course after the parade on Shattuck Avenue, 
we went to San Francisco,  and the Band played at various 
alumni reunions.  We were offered a drink here and there by 
some of the generous alumni. And it was after this trip to 
the alumni reunions, that I took the 14 bandsmen on my jeep.  
Bob Desky was among them, Bob Barton and others.  And there 
were student rallies going on all over the fraternity 
district.  There was a big bonfire going on at Piedmont and 
Channing, and that's where the policeman stopped me coming 
along with the 14 musicians and playing my trombone and 
driving the jeep with the other hand. That was the night, 
actually it was the Friday night before the Big Game, after 
the alumni reunions, and before the Big Game on Saturday.  
[In those days "Fraternity Row" extended, house after house, 
along Piedmont Ave. from Cowell Hospital (Soon to become the 
Haas School of Business) to Dwight Way.  This was Pappy's 
first season and the Bears were going to the Rose Bowl. - 
NHC]

Dan:  My recollections living in Berkeley at that time and 
being a Cal fan, even at my tender age, was that after an 
important win, the City was one big massive group of rowdy 
students.  Students would gather up whatever wood they could 
find, garden fences and things like that, and pile them up 
and make bonfires in the street intersections.  It is 
interesting to note in hindsight that the next time these 
sorts of events happened with any regularity and any 
importance was during the free speech and Sproul Plaza 
riots, the difference being that in the '40's it was campus 
oriented to raise cheer and good feelings toward the 
athletic events, whereas the latter events had little to do 
with the university but were oriented toward the politics of 
the era, such as the Vietnam War and so forth.

Bill, I'd like to ask you, when was the first time you met 
Pappy Waldorf?

Bill:  When Pappy Waldorf was called to be the football 
coach in the fall of 1947, he arrived of course during the 
summer and a bunch of the Cal bandsmen went down to welcome 
him at the University Avenue train station.  I recall that 
we wore our straw hats.  The Straw Hat Band was beginning to 
be organized at that time, and we went down and had a rally 
to welcome him.  Some of the yell leaders were there, a 
great many students and University people.  Pappy was quite 
impressed, I think, to see this kind of welcome for an 
incoming football coach.  It was the beginning of a long and 
friendly relationship between Pappy and the Cal Band.

Dan:  I remember people talking about that event.  They were 
so glad to have this famous coach coming after Frank 
Wickhorst that there was quite a bit of student enthusiasm.  
The students created quite a scene there at the Berkeley 
train station.  I should also add that the reason it was at 
the Berkeley train station was because this was still in the 
days when commercial air travel was not very common.  The 
mode of transcontinental travel was by train, and Pappy came 
from Northwestern University.

Bill, could you give us some further insight regarding the 
special relationship that Pappy and the Band had developed 
in subsequent years.

Bill:  I should explain that I only had one year with Pappy 
Waldorf.  He came in '47, which was my senior year.  I 
suspect that during later years of his tenure he developed a 
much closer relationship with the Cal Band.  I do remember 
the last time I saw Pappy was in the '60s or '70s.  I'd come 
back to attend a game at Cal and was sitting with my friend 
Bob Barton.  Up in the section R or S on the east side of 
the field and north of the rooting section, and Pappy 
Waldorf was sitting quite near us.  We welcomed him and 
everyone stood up when he took his seat.  He wasn't the 
coach anymore by this time, but people came up and greeted 
him and I shook hands with him and said "What a pleasure to 
see you again, Mr. Waldorf.  Really delighted to see you 
here."  And he died within a very few years after that, 
probably in the '70s I think.

Dan:  Back to the Straw Hat Band.  Can you give us any 
insight into the actual origins of the Straw Hat Band?

Bill:  As I mentioned I belonged to the Delta Kappa Epsilon 
fraternity, and I found a little straw hat upstairs in one 
of the closets in the Deke house.  It had a red band on it, 
and no one seemed to know who it belonged to, so I put it on 
and began to wear it to some of the basketball games and 
baseball games when we didn't wear regular band uniforms, we 
just wore usual street clothes in those days for pep bands 
when there was just a small band turn out.  And other 
bandsmen began to buy straw hats and also to wear them.  And 
this was the origin of the Straw Hat Band.  Probably in 
1947.  Of course since then it has become a very strong 
tradition, but it just started very informally that this was 
something we wore with our shirts and slacks when we played 
for basketball.  We also played at hockey games at Iceland, 
and baseball games.  Fran Wenrich, the wife of Dave Wenrich 
who was senior manager the year after me, she remembers a 
baseball game when we carried a bunch of beer in my jeep and 
took it to the game.  And we had an umbrella, it was raining 
at the baseball game and I said "Don't let the beer get 
wet!," and Fran carefully kept the beer under the umbrella 
so the extra beer wouldn't get wet while we played a pep 
band for the baseball game. Dave Wenrich was senior manager 
in '48-'49.  He and his wife, Fran, are very good friends of 
ours, and I'll be seeing them next week.  Fran and I share 
the same birthday, and we'll be together December 11th.

[We had a joke about my straw hat: Hunt Johnson would call 
out "Hey Bill, how's your old straw hat?"  And I would 
answer back "Never been felt!" (Explanation: felt hat, not a 
straw hat!!).  My original straw hat, from the Deke House 
closet, had a bright red hat band.  I wore it to the 
Virginia Seminary in the Fall of 1948, but it finally 
disintegrated from old age.  I later bought other straw hats 
in San Francisco and later at Dayton's in Minneapolis (there 
were none available at any stores in South Dakota!).  For 
many years, a straw hat was a sort of trade-mark with me, 
and I wore one every summer until the late 1960's.  These 
hats (called "sailor straws" in those days) were very 
popular with San Francisco business men in the 1930's, and 
at the end of each summer, after Labor Day, they would sail 
them off the ferry boats into the Bay on their way home from 
San Francisco, and buy a new one for the following summer.  
As a young boy, I can remember several San Francisco lawyers 
and business men on our street, who would wear their straw 
hats to work every day in the summer time (this was before 
the bridges, when everyone rode the trains and then the 
ferries to San Francisco) - BF]

Dan:  Would you take a few moments to explain the Band's 
administrative structure and how it related to other 
administrative groups on campus?

Bill:  ASUC, Associated Students of the University of 
California, was the student run organization that took care 
of all the student activities.  Athletics was under the 
ASUC. Music, drama, intrafraternity council, all of these 
different things were part of the Associated Students.  They 
had an executive committee, and it had representatives from 
different kinds of activities.  The one I was associated 
with was the Music Council, representatives of the Band, the 
Glee Club, the Treble Clef, they had separate organizations 
for men and women in those days.  The Glee Club was a men's 
organization, Treble Clef was women, and there was a music 
council representing these three groups.  I was the 
representative of the Band on the music council, and we 
would make a budget that we would need for the Band, Glee 
Club and Treble Clef, and then we would submit our request 
to the ASUC executive committee.  [The year I was Senior 
Manager and sat on the Music Council, some of the other 
members were Joe Willits, Senior Manager of the Glee Club, 
and Mary Powell, Senior Manager of Treble Clef.  Farnham 
Jory was on the Music Council, also a Band member. - BF]  
Don Lang was the president of the ASUC in 47-48, and he was 
the one who directed the ASUC activities that year.  There 
was a professional ASUC advisor.  Brutus Hamilton had this 
job for a while [Also Kenneth Priestly - BF], I don't 
remember some of the others.  They were professional 
executive directors hired by the ASUC, and they were full 
time employees.  All the rest of it was done by students, 
there was only one other full time employee.  The ticket 
office was a part of that.  I think there was a ticket 
manager, Mrs. Gowdy, who lived down the street from us on 
Mendocino.  

(There is a break in the tape here, can't hear the beginning 
of next sentence.)  Sproul and Dean Stone.  Bob Sproul and 
my father were bachelors together living in the faculty club 
in the early 1910's, before either one of them were married.  
They both had bachelor apartments in the faculty club.  He 
was an usher at my dad's wedding, and my mother and father 
took part in his wedding.  He was a long time friend of our 
family.  As soon as my brother and my sister and I came to 
Cal, Sproul recognized us and would always greet us on the 
campus when we met.  A wonderful man, he had a hearty, 
booming laugh, and at University meetings he would sing "All 
Hail Blue and Gold" at the top of his voice standing up 
there in front of the Greek Theater or the Men's Gym if the 
meeting was indoors, a wonderful spirit.  [He also knew and 
would sing all the verses to "The Cardinals Be Damned." - 
NHC]  Twenty seven or twenty eight years as University 
President, the longest anyone has held that job.  Dean 
Stone, Hurford E. Stone, was the Dean of Students during my 
undergraduate years.  He had been a class mate of my mother 
in the class of 1910, they were class mates together. After 
the combined musical/jeep piling incident previously 
referred to, since I got into the paper and caused disfavor 
to the University, I was called to the office of Dean Stone, 
the Dean of Students, and as he realized that he needed to 
discipline me in some way, he put me under censure.  A 
certain mark was stamped on my transcript to show that I had 
been punished with the university censure.  Fortunately I 
said "This won't mean I have to give up the Cal Band 
managership, will it?", and Stone said "No, you can still 
continue as manager but I want Mr. Cushing to know about 
this, that you are under discipline."  So I finished my 
senior year that way, under discipline.

Dan:  You've had a very interesting subsequent career.  
Perhaps you can explain to us how you are able to reconcile 
your student behavior with the career that you finally chose 
for yourself.

Bill:  The Cal Band was pretty rowdy during the post-war 
years, because as I said a lot of us had been war veterans, 
we'd been overseas, we'd seen a lot of life, and we brought 
back a lot of enthusiasm, and pleasure and enjoying party 
time.  We drank a lot in those days, and that's the way that 
we were.  And how does this reconcile with my present 
career, I'm an Episcopal minister, a priest of the Episcopal 
church?  I should say that this really began during the 
years I was in the Army.  I was away from Cal three and a 
half years, and it was during the military experience that I 
began to think of the ministry as a career.  When I came 
back to Cal after three and a half years in the Army, I 
began the process of entering the ministry at the same time 
I was doing my junior and senior year in college.  There may 
not seem to be much similarity between the two!  I like to 
tell people that I felt I should offer myself to the 
ministry to atone for my sins during my undergraduate years.  
Repay my debt to society by going into the ministry, after a 
rah rah college life and party time, and what could be 
called drunken driving I guess the time I was arrested with 
the fourteen musicians on my jeep.  I've always been a 
Christian and I felt that the Lord was calling me to be a 
minister in the church, but I wanted to get the pleasure out 
of my system, have the fun in life and enjoy it while I 
could.  They tell a story about St. Augustine, the great 
church leader of the fourth century, whose attitude they 
said was much like the fraternity playboy.  Augustine was 
quite a rah rah boy during his youth, used to party around, 
drank a lot and went out with the girls.  They said his 
prayer was like that of a fraternity playboy - "Dear God, 
please make me good, but not just yet."  I suppose I felt 
some of that myself.

Dan:  Having made that decision, to go into the ministry 
then, could you give us a brief synopsis of your subsequent 
career.

Bill:  After graduating from Cal in June 1948, I entered the 
Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, Virginia.  I 
spent three years there preparing for the ministry. I was 
ordained by Bishop Block in Grace Cathedral in August 1951, 
just 40 years ago. My wife and I spent three years in the 
Bay Area.  My first church was in Orinda.  I was the first 
resident minister of St. Stephens Episcopal Church in 
Orinda.  Then two years in Oakland at St. Paul's church by 
Lake Merritt.  I was the assistant minister there.  
Seventeen years in South Dakota, we worked on three 
different Indian reservations, with the Sioux Indians.  The 
Episcopal church has a large Indian ministry in South 
Dakota.  From 1971 to '89 we returned to California and 
served in two small parishes in the San Joaquin Valley.  
First in Reedley and then at Wood Lake.  These are two small 
towns between Fresno and Visalia.  I retired from the full 
time ministry in 1989 and returned to Berkeley in April of 
that year, and have really enjoyed being back in Berkeley 
these last two and a half years.  We attend all the home 
football games, we go to concerts and lectures, and really 
enjoy being back in the Bay Area, back where my roots are.  
It's a real joy to be home again and we're back in the same 
house where I was born.  When my parents died in the '70's 
we inherited this house, and we rented it to tenants for 
fourteen years and two years ago moved back into the house, 
so we're back where I started again, back in north Berkeley.  
What a pleasure, what a happy life it's been, how many good 
memories I have.

Dan:  This has been a very informative interview, Bill.  
Thank you very much for sharing your insight and memories 
with us.

Interview with Bill Fay

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