Oral History Interview with Pee Wee King

He lived at 7th and Hill. He said, “when I really loved steaks, I couldn't afford them. Now that I can afford them, I want them really rare.” I remember when I was a boy Mom and Pa used to take us up to the farm, to my grandparents. It was in the springtime and my grandmother would take those little old chicks — she called the spring chickens — go whack, whack, whack, and then she'd dip them in that hot boiling water and get the feathers off. I had to kill chickens a couple of times. It was easier for me to chop their heads off but, my mother would twist their necks.

Now that hogs--I'd help them with the hogs. And my grandfather Pachinski (??) showed me how — on the right side of the left side — hit the heart with a dagger about (??) long and then scrape the hides and then when they'd take the insides out, both my parents saved the intestines and made polish sausage. And when I came down south, well Dad, he just laughed. He said, “you can't eat that stuff — it's chitlins down here in Tennessee.” He said,” hell, that's better than Polish sausage.” We stopped in Paris, Tennessee. — that's where Aunt Julia is now — and we played the theater there['s] [a] and restaurant next door, and he says, “come on,” and I says, “Mr. Frank, what is it?” And he says, “I know you don't, but you're going to try it.” And by God, he bought me that thing and we had a break and I still chewed it — it was all white — and I said, “No more, chitlins for me. “

The large intestine of the hog, we stuffed with garlic, beef, and pork. She'd mix it before, and we'd have a long stick like a broom handle, and she'd just move that along [stuffing the intestine with the sausage]. And nobody died from making their own food back then. My father was a Gary Cooper-type of guy — tall, 6'1", maybe a little taller — I don't know. My mother was a little bitty girl — probably 5'4'' — 5'5". She was a busy person — you couldn't never catch her — she was always doing something. If it wasn't mending clothes, she was fixing something to eat. Most of the girls and boys had already left the farm, and our cousins — many we called aunt and uncle—would come and stay with us a while. Kelly and Anna married, and they'd take in — we didn't call them boarders at that time — they were relatives! It was fine with us because there was enough room, and rather than pay that hard-earned money that was hard to come by, Mom always gave them a break, and so did Anna. My mother's mother and father separated after the girls were pretty big and they had to run the farm with my grandmother. And my grandfather — I'd never seen him when he wasn't stubborn. My grandmother used to say he was stubborn — especially in wintertime when there wasn't too much to do. He was on the board of directors of the school, and he packed up and went away and nobody knew where he was for a long time. Finally, he broke down and told them, and the sons could find him at least. They drove up to Dunkirk, N.Y. and that's where they found him — on ????.

My father had to go to work every morning at 7 o'clock at the tannery. He was superintendent — he had 4 or 5 Mexicans working under him. The little Mexican girl whose dad worked for my dad — and I used to carry her books home from school. Her name was Delores Cleveland. Of course, that wasn't their real name. Coming from the farm, he knew all about hides — how they should be treated and put together and baled — they used to buy bales of hides from other slaughterhouses and bring them in there. — So, he got the job as superintendent.

It's a dirty job, knocking the hogs in the head, I was in there. They didn't do the slaughtering there. They would buy the hides from the slaughterhouses. Milwaukee was a big town at that time. It hasn't grown very much since I left. It's about half-a-million now. When I left, it was I'd say about 200,000. Only time I'd get to see much of it was when the fire engines would come out with the horses and I'd chase after them. I didn't go downtown much until later on. I was pretty much at home — busy all the time. My sister learned to play the piano, and I was the violin. And when she didn't want the accordion anymore, I took lessons. And I think she always wanted to be in show business. She married a fine guy and they stayed together until a few years ago when he died.

Show business was in my blood from my dad's side, and also my grandfather. My mother had no objection to my going into show business because she met my father through his band in Sobieski. He was making a living from farming — this was for fun. And I guess there was a little glamor to it at that time, too, He was tough on her. She'd have to sit on that concertina case, and she couldn't dance with the guys because he was so jealous.

They were courting. They'd see each other after church and once in a while, he'd come out and visit Mom at the farm. That was beer country. He'd drink beer or Schnapps, and boilermakers they called them — drink a small glass of whiskey and chase it with a beer. Nobody ever gets drunk. I don't remember much heavy drinking when I was growing up. When he entertained, my dad was always the bartender — and one of the guys was my godfather — he'd always measure the drinks. So, nobody would get too much. One of the guys I remember used to drive a milk wagon and he had this horse with him. In those days they delivered milk, and Pa told him, “John, don't go overboard with your route.” He says, “don't worry about me, my horse knows everything about my route — if he could reach around and carry the milk, he'd do it.” And I always remembered that — it was true.

I wasn't bothered by drunks when I was playing. But once, just a few years ago,a Black boy at an NCO club —when I was working the service camps and military bases. We were on the third floor of this NCO club, a fellow about Sammy Davis’s size come up to me, and he said, “you ain't ever played your hit record — why don't you play it — I want to dance to that.” I said, “what song do you want to hear?” He said, oh, "12th Street Rag".

I said, “sir, we didn't have that as a hit — that was Pee Wee Hunt.” He said, “it was you — don't make any excuses on me.” I said, “we'll play it for you — but look, I got a country-western band. You don't see any horns in here do you? It's all string band.” He says, “that guy on the end sounds like (??)” I says, “go see if he can play it.” So, he went over to Big Jim — 300 Ibs. — steel guitar player — one of the best in the country. He says, “can YOU play "12th Street Rag" for me?” He says,” we all can.” He says, “then why in the hell don't he play it for me?” He says, “Pee Wee Hunt had the record and I know — I remember that.” He says, “that's not Pee Wee Hunt — that's Pee Wee King.” He couldn’t convince him. He finally said, “you guys lie to me anymore — I'll use a switchblade on you.” And it scared me, so I went to the manager of the NCO club, I said, “look, this guy's got it in his head I'm Pee Wee Hunt.” I says, “I can't convince him. “He says, “don't worry he won't bother you.” He says, “he bothers the musicians here all the time.”

So finally, after another hour or two, they carried him off. And then I got to thinking, he'll stand outside and wait for us until we load up and then follow us home — to the motel. And they said, “no, he won't” — the sergeant said, “I'll give you an escort. And you won't find that guy within 20 miles of your motel.” So that was it.

And then once at Sawyer Air Force base in northern Michigan, they were bugging us to play more Cajun music because there were 2 or 3 Cajuns there and we didn't play Jambalaya or nothing. I didn't think they were dance tunes and I never even thought of them either until towards the end of the dance. And he went up to the manager, and he said, “you didn't ask me to play those Cajun numbers for you.” He said he don't [doesn’t] know them, and he come to me, and I said, “we play them, but you can't dance to them.” And he went back and started a fight with the manager, and it took 5 or 6 guys — a battle royale.

And another battle royale was the Navy base right outside Chicago, and that's where Martin Doblucsy (??) got killed, and we were up there, and the guy wanted me to play the national anthem and I said, “no, we're going to play South and songs like that.” He said, “don't do it — I'd rather you pack up and get out.”

Once, we were at the helicopter school at Ozark, Alabama. The man who was running the motel said, “Mr. King, here's your next president,” — he said, “George Wallace.” And I've still got that pamphlet and everything else about George Wallace. And I had to admit I learned to like him because he played the Tennessee Waltz everywhere he went with his (??) and danced to it. This is where I was when Martin Luther King was killed. We played about an hour, and he said, don't, leave them here, we'll guard them, and go back to the motel.” He said, “everything's shut down;” he said, “it would be like a funeral in this place” — they had a lot of Blacks. Well, it was right after that march to Selma. And these sail[ors] didn't know a battleship from a rowboat. I think one or two of them danced with some pretty girl — the girlfriend of one of the boys who belonged to the Great Lakes Training — and he said, “let's just rack them out completely,” and they did. Boy, I mean there was a battle royale on that floor — I know that.

And that's when the manager come up and I says, “I'll play The South and Alabama Jubilee,” and he said, “just sack It up — forget it.” Those were Blacks fighting whites. Right after Martin Luther King, I played Ozark very, very often. Anytime I needed a date going down to Florida or anything like that, I'd play Ozark. Any day of the week. I kept in touch with a lot of those guys — I kept a list of all the clubs we played. I even played Washington — the big air base there — played the officers' club there — a big dance. We had Bull Durham — he was a mandolin player. And every orchestra that came in, country style or western, like Ernest Tubb or anybody like that, he'd say, “I'm going to join them.” And he'd MC the floor show. Of course, it was a damn good floor show at that time. And we played that one all the time. That's back in the '60s and '70s.

My father had a good sense of humor although, I never heard him tell a joke. In his spare time, he'd probably repair something around the house — there was always something to fix — it was an old house. My mother knitted and being a seamstress, she loved to sew. All the girls who lived with us — boarded — she repaired their dresses and kept them in order, and all our clothes. She taught me how to make noodles — homemade chicken noodle soup. Big, thick ones for Polish noodle soup. And then dumplings. We called them pierogies — they're flat like this and filled with cabbage or fruit of some kind. You dip them in hot water; let them cook a while; then throw them in the grease; and bake just a little while and they're ready to eat. Picrogas — in Polish. And she was on the air with one of my disc jockey friends up there — he's still there — 90 something years old on the air playing country music and polka music — and he said, “Frances", I got to tell you, Helen Pachinsky invited me to their house for supper Sunday and I went, and that woman should get a blue ribbon in Milwaukee or Green Bay or wherever because that's the best pierogies I ever had.” And he got so many phone calls from people — and that's unusual, so he said, “Helen, what are we going to do?” And she said,” I'll give you the recipe.” And so, he ran the recipe on the air, and she got a lot of compliments on it. Being the oldest daughter, she had to learn to cook. And grandpa left, too.

I got hit by a car, mom sent me to the bakery to get something special for a birthday celebration or something like that. We didn't live too far from the bakery, but I took a short cut. And walking across the street, I didn't look when I should of, and this guy came out of the alley as fast he could — he must have been running away from somebody — and he ran over me, and I was sent to the hospital. I was pretty well banged up but thank God, nothing serious. I come out of it all right. I learned to be nice to your doctor and nurse because they're the ones who'll take care of you. My dad was really provoked with the guy, so my mother talked with this judge — Judge Padley — and he and Dad come up to see me one night. And the judge says, “your dad wants to sue the guy for damages.” And I said, “Judge, we didn't have any damage — here I am.” So, I carried a little note in my billfold for years: “Frank Pachinsky was run over by a car, 6th and Mitchell Street”— that was in the paper. About the first time I got my name in the paper. The judge was a friend of the family and when my sister got married, he drove from Milwaukee to Sobieski and attended the wedding. He couldn't sleep in the house, so he slept in the barn, in a straw stack. It was a hit-and-run accident. They probably did try to find him but, I don’t remember whether there were witnesses or not.

None of my brothers or sisters died when we were growing up. But the big word in those days was consumption— tuberculosis. But none of us had it, thank God. We were a pretty healthy family thanks to my mother's cooking, and my father's fermented beer. One time the plug came off and we thought we were shot with a cannon. He made good beer — malt and hops and everything — and he also made good root beer for the kids. Made it in the cellar. I remember the odor. And Mom would purify the bottles first. The trouble you had to go through to make one bottle of beer!

You use a certain amount of malt and certain amount of hops, and you'd boil the water and put them in there and let it ferment first. When it's done, you fill the bottles with a dipper. Usually after suppertime, I'd go down and run the cream separator. That was on the farm. That was more my job than helping make beer. He also made beer on the farm.

At church, there would be social activities in the auditorium or in the basement. A partition would divide where the grown-ups could get beer and the children soft drinks. No hard drinks, no whiskey. And that was during Prohibition, too. But we had no trouble from the law. It was homemade beer, including my father's, that was donated for church functions. Especially for the Fourth of July picnics, they'd have Pa's beer. And the priests would ask us to play the dance music at night. And then when basketball season started, I'd play basketball at the church, too. I had a lot of fun.

One of my best friends in high school I met through basketball — Angelo Ciardoni. Very good guy. We used to keep in touch, he got to Madison, Wisconsin, and became a schoolteacher. He'd come to our house and have Polish sausage, and I'd go to his house and have Italian sausage. Angelo Ciardoni— I knew him in high school. I think he was at Platteville, Wisconsin; he was a teacher up there.

I got to enjoy German food, too. Alfred Keller (??) was a German. He was my next best friend. We used to go ice skating all the time. And he'd sell papers with me on the boats when the boats would freeze up on the dock at Michigan — the big across the--lake boats that go out in the ocean. In the wintertime, he and I'd would be the first guys to go out in the morning and sort the papers and sell them out on the boats. The Sunday paper cost a nickel or dime at that time. Everybody would chip in and say “give ‘em a quarter, boys, given ‘em a quarter.” And we’d take them out on the boats and sell them to the guys. These were ocean liners that landed in Milwaukee. I was in high school.

I had a paper route, too, but Sundays we'd go on the boats. We sold The Milwaukee Journal. The other paper there was The Wisconsin News. There was something about the guy who drove the truck and dropped off the papers for The Milwaukee Journal. He had a metal shed and a heater in it for the boys who delivered the papers; he had about 8 or 9 heated sheds and we used to come there with our sleds and get our papers to deliver the next morning. Sometimes I had to get up as early as 4 or 4:30 If something big happened like the Jack Dempsey fight or a big explosion, they'd put out an extra edition and we'd go out at midnight selling them. We would sell those on the street rather than deliver to the homes, but we'd follow the same route because the people in the area knew us.

The daily paper sold for 3 cents. We'd get a cent of that — a third of it. We paid 2 cents for them and sell them for whatever we got for them. Most of the people would give us nickels, especially at the factory. I never went out on the boats [when in motion] but I used to stand in awe just bring (??) them and would marvel at those guys who'd suffer all winter living on that boat. But they loved it — they say, once a sailor, always a sailor. They were Wisconsin people and Michigan people.

One thing I learned was that Milwaukee was the first place in the U.S. that took garbage and made fertilizer out of it. There was a little island called Jones Island right off the Lake Michigan shore and they disposed of the garbage there. They were doing this when I was a kid. You could hear the foghorn late at night, it used to wake me up on Sunday.

We lived about a mile or a mile and a quarter from the lake. We'd pull a coaster or a sled to the lake on Sunday morning. And my friend, Uncle Kallas’ youngest brother, and I would walk together. His name was Alfred Kallas. His father had a team of horses and they delivered coal for the coal company. A lot of times we used to go help them harness them up —this is [when we were] kids.

I remember Mother would hold out a stick. She whipped me if I had done something she didn't want me to do or if I was late for something. One time she came after me and I knew that I had broken a window. A guy come told her it was down the street at one of these taverns. I made a slingshot. They knew who I was, so they came up to my house and Ma says, “you're going to get it.” I says,” I don't think so.” She says, “keep on teasing, keep on teasing” — she was making me suffer. And when Pa came home from work, I ran under the car. She says, “you come out from there to eat.” I said, “I ain't going to come out there to eat — I'm going to eat at Aunt Anna's” — she lived next door. And she says, “what is it, Helen — what do you want to whip him for?” She says, “he broke a window down here.” She says, “well, take it out of his money he gets.” But I got whipped — she wouldn't forget that.

My father only whipped me one time. The bathroom was right off the kitchen. And spitballs we used to make, and I hit my sister in the eye. I come [came] out of the bathroom and she said, “come on, you're supposed to dry the dishes.” I said, “stick your head out there once more and I'll let you have it”. So, she did. When I come [came] out, wow, my dad got me by the shoulder and put me down there and kicked my rear. And he said, “is that enough or do you want me to use the strap? Do you know not to do that again”. And I said, “yes, sir.” She wasn't hurt but it did bother me because I could have put her eye out. If she had stuck her rear end, I'd probably have shot it but she just happen[ed] to put her head there. I remembered that for a long time.

I remember these guys from school were having a snowball fight and they started throwing snowballs at her. So, I stood up there and said,” Ok, the first guy quit throwing snowballs at my sister.” And by God, they beat the hell out of me — three of them! Growing up in the city then you were able to find out who your friends were and who you were able to trust. You take like Angelo — I never had no trouble with him — we were buddy-buddies. And he would stick up for me once in a while because he was a little taller than I was. I'm not quite 5'7" but I only weight 110, 112 pounds.

I was never beaten up by any of the older boys, but I was beaten by the guy who beat me in the Golden Gloves Tournament. I was a boxer in Green Bay. I was 14 and weighed 112 pounds. So, I went in as a flyweight and the guy who beat me — he was Italian — he's dead now — we fought the opening fight and he beat me — he beat me good — and that taught me my mother didn't know I was fighting. My dad took me to Green Bay, and she didn't know where we were going — Pa said it was something for the car. Pa came to [the] dressing room after I was knocked out and he said, “what do you think, kid?” I said, “no more for me — that’s enough.” I fought for the Eagles then — the Eagles Squad — and for a long time I had the Eagle pin and was very proud of it. And the guy who was our instructor — Frank Patruski — he fought Camero (??) if you remember that name — he was an exhibition fighter — and he fought Camero. — It lasted 3 rounds — and he got $100 for it. My brother-in-law, Irene's husband, he was lightweight champion of Wisconsin, and finally he gave it up too. He used to suffer — all that training and punching bags — and his stomach muscles were hurting too. She made him give it up. His real name was (???) and he fought under the name of Whitey Carson. But I never won a fight. And when I said I wasn't go[ing] to fight anymore, Pa was very happy about that.

First, I played the harmonica. And then the violin. And then the concertina. And then the accordion. And then later in life, the cordovox, which was built like an accordion exactly, but it is electrified. It's like carrying a private organ. You carry the wires with you and plug them in. It's not a new instrument— I played it when I was on television in Chicago in 1952.

I played one song on the guitar when I was with the King's Jesters. It was Cowboy Jack. It was written by Carson Robinson of New York. When I first started in the business, we wore semi-tuxedos and regular street clothes and played the dances, but this was during the starvation period back in the '30s. In 1929, '30, '31, it was tough — I mean tough. That was the period of the King's Jesters. Then when I came south, it was country music — the period of the Golden West Cowboys. We used to buy the songbooks by Jimmy Rodgers, Gene Autry, and Carson Robinson and one or two others. In fact, I've got some of those upstairs.

I didn't know the difference between western and country. Gene Autry was western — he dressed western. Jimmy Rodgers wasn't — he was in a straw hat and a check (??). It wasn't the cowboy image that interested me so much as the music — how simple it was. And the accordion was the thing but after I went to work with Autry, you had to play single notes.

I taught myself how to play the harmonica — just picking it up and playing it, When I took up the violin, I thought all you had to do was scrape the bow across, and my dad said, “kid, it's not that easy — come on, I'll show you,” and, he brought out a Polish dance (???) and I looked at them notes and said, “wow — that's like classical music against pop singing,” but I fought it out. And I took lessons.

The concertina was next. My dad showed me where the numbers were on the concertina, and I had to match the numbers to the numbers they had on the music — in the book.

Ma and Pa went to the show one night and he brought down that concertina and said “here, get the book on the music stand and this is what I want you to learn”. And I says, “that's going to be a piece of cake.” Over the Waves -- that's the first song.

It's a simple thing and one of the easiest, to play on a concertina. My brother was working with us for a while and he went to Nashville and this band was looking for a concertina and didn't know what a concertina was — an accordion, or something — I said, “my brother is coming down to visit me — Slim, why don’t you take him out.” And he worked with that Oklahoma Cowboy group. It was Slim Smith and his Oklahoma Cowboys — I went to visit him at the radio station. He said, “can you still play one of those things?” And I said, “sure, watch this”, and he went, “woah — that ain't for me.” He put it back, and I said, “let my brother do it.” The cordovox — it's like the accordion exactly. I didn't take instruction in that — I took instruction on the accordion book from (??).

When I was growing up in Milwaukee and on the farm, I had a couple of girlfriends. One of them was Sylvia Machinski (??) — they lived about two doors away from us. And then on the farm was one of my cousins — Mary Drobeck — I stood up to my sister's wedding with her. To me, she was the prettiest girl I ever saw but she was going with another fellow at the time. We called them cousins, but she was from the Drobeck family, but that was the only time I ever danced with her or expressed myself. She married a policeman back in Milwaukee. Sylvia was going with another musician in a polka band, and she married him.

I was 22 when I married Lydia and she was 19. I hocked my tuxedo and got her first engagement ring. $6 — you couldn't knock anybody's eye out with it if you wanted to! The King's Jesters was a group I put together in high school, and I was the leader of the group. We had Lenny Shaw on guitar and banjo; Fat Mike on drums, and Ted Fabian (??) on tenor set. He was about 250 pounds. He had one of those big drums with a hula dancer on it, and he had a light inside and whenever we played, you could see that hula dancer hula. We had him right in front. There were no microphones in those days. We had to sing over the crowd — if we had a big crowd in a tavern, why hell, they'd drown us out. I was right at 15. We played through high school and then we went on the road.

During summer vacation, we'd play the lakes around Milwaukee because we built up a reputation. And I told my uncle, “this is for me, I quit your wiping the pens,” and he said, “why don't you go to vocational school to be a draftsman.” I didn’t learn anything. I learned more building for my mom — I built her first breadboard, her first book rack. And then I learned how to put a car together and how to take it apart. I could read stuff, but couldn’t get Interested in it [at drafting school].

The King's Jesters stayed together about a year after high school. I got a car then too. A Marquette Touring Car — about 1930. It wasn't new — we bought it at Walshouski (??) Auto Dealers and my brother-in-law Bruno let me have the first couple of payments on it. And I was living with them at the time. It worked out perfect — they had two cars then — one for Irene and one for him.

I 'd pick up Ted. Fat Mike had his own car. He a little Ford with a rumble seat. He used to put his base drum in there all set up with the pedal on. I'd pick up Ted with his tenor sax and Lenny Shaw drove a car. We played current pop music. And we made up funny songs —novelty tunes. And then we followed guys like Freddie Schnikelfitz (??) and his band who did those crazy things — when we'd see them in a movie, we'd go on and learn them right away. And when Spike Jones come out, he set the world on fire as far as I was concerned. Ted used to tease me — if we had kept on, we could have been Spike Jones, we didn't know that.

And we'd sing songs in English and Polish because Ted speaks Polish and I speak Polish — when the words would be easy — "When the Moon Comes Over the Mountain" — stuff like that. We called our performances engagement. For a tavern, just the four of us, we'd ask for $25. Then at the lakes, we were asking for $35. And if we played a wedding, we asked for $50. Sometimes we'd have five — I'd get an extra man. I'd get an extra $5 — more than the others — because I was the leader. And gas money, too, that was only 8 cents a mile. Ted went to college and Lenny Shaw passed away. And Fat Mike, I don’t know what happened to him after we broke up.

The Badger State Barn Dance was just like the WLS Barn Dance in Chicago. They had stars, guitar players, singers, fiddle players, accordion players, comics. The WLS Barn Dance was so popular — the first time I saw the barn dance advertised was at some northside theaters. It said come one, come all, and hear the original WIS Barn Dance — Wisconsin Barn Dance — and underneath that was Badger State Barn Dance. I played it a couple of times to make acquaintances. It turned out to be the right thing to do when we needed musicians to come to Knoxville to originate the Golden West Cowboys.

Three of those people came with me. I came home to Milwaukee and Mr. Quartet Man — he's the one who ran the Wisconsin Barn Dance. I took three of their favorite performers — Cowboy Jack, he eras a singer from Brownsville, Kentucky.; and Curley Rodes and Texas Daisy were brother and sister; and it worked out period for us. I was learning from Mr. Frank how to do the thinking. And I said, “dad, don't worry about a thing —I got three people.” Cowboy Jack is a great Western singer and great Western voice, and he's tall, tall. And later on in life, he was a blond. Ernest Tub, Curley Rodes and Texas Daisy sang songs that Lula Belle and Scotty used to sing; I played the accordion, so everything is falling in place. And I hired a fiddle player from Indiana — Abner Sims — because they played the polkas more up there than they did the square dances. And they didn't play square dances like they do at the Grand Old Opry — they played the cloggin’ [clogging] stuff. I never knew what square dancing was until I got to Nashville.