(BTW- that is a '65 Vette...)
Imagine, if you will, early 1971 in rural South Dakota. I had only
recently moved to the state, and I
had heard about this "thing" people did to newlyweds called a
Shivaree, but I didn't believe the rumors.
One night a couple of weeks
after our very small wedding, we were wakened around midnight (oh all right, we
were interrupted- we were 18 years old for crying out loud) by people banging
on the sides of our first home, an 8'x35' trailer (which was in a
trailer court, by the way, and why the police weren't called is still
beyond me).
Our uninvited guests hooted and hollered and honked and in general made a wild rumpus. They demanded to be let in and fed and given drinks. Like I said, we were 18 so there was no booze in the house, and we were likewise very poor and had only a box of cornflakes, a sack of potatoes and a cinnamon shaker to set out for the crowd. Luckily, they brought their own food and beverage (of which we partook liberally).
Our uninvited guests hooted and hollered and honked and in general made a wild rumpus. They demanded to be let in and fed and given drinks. Like I said, we were 18 so there was no booze in the house, and we were likewise very poor and had only a box of cornflakes, a sack of potatoes and a cinnamon shaker to set out for the crowd. Luckily, they brought their own food and beverage (of which we partook liberally).
The highlights of the evening, as I remember them fuzzily, included having our mattress taken from the trailer and ferried down the street at a pretty good clip on the shoulders of three very drunk fellas. Our only set of sheets was dumped into a full bathtub. Someone very kindly redistributed the potatoes into assorted nooks and crannies (some of which we did not find until several months later when we moved from the trailer into a real house).I remember seriously absorbing assorted bits of sage advice from the older married ladies (who were probably all of 25 at the time) and being toasted and teased endlessly.
I vividly remember Charlie Reinhardt bursting into tears after spilling sloe-gin and coke down the front of his white shirt. At about 4:00 am, the crowd departed, leaving a fair sized wad of dollar bills behind (which came in mighty handy- we were, as I said, reeeeealy poor), a missing mattress, a couple of people passed out on the living room floor and a happy 18 year old married couple who were far too drunk to take up where they'd left off hours earlier. All in all, a fun evening.
That was 42 years ago, and
yes, we're still together. I'm rather sorry the practice died out.
