RIP C.W. McCall

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Vandal
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RIP C.W. McCall

#1 Post by Vandal » Sun Apr 03, 2022 11:14 am

C.W. McCall, ‘Convoy’ Country Singer, Dead at 93

C.W. McCall, an adman who found fame as a country music singer with songs about 18-wheelers, including the 1976 crossover No. 1 “Convoy,” has died at 93. According to his son Bill Fries III, McCall had been battling cancer and was in hospice care in his Colorado home when he died Friday, April 1.

“Breaker one-nine, this here’s the Rubber Duck,” McCall intoned in the novelty hit “Convoy,” a song that celebrated CB radios and the community of long-haul truck drivers who used them. Released in November 1975, the spoken-word saga would top both the country and pop charts the next year, sell more than 2 million copies, inspire a 1978 movie of the same name starring Kris Kristofferson, and help add jargon like “10-4, good buddy” into the national lexicon. But the song and the CB radio craze it’d help inspire all started in an Omaha, Nebraska, office.

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Re: RIP C.W. McCall

#2 Post by Bob Juch » Sun Apr 03, 2022 2:22 pm

73s :(
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Re: RIP C.W. McCall

#3 Post by Spock » Sun Apr 03, 2022 8:13 pm

Just a couple of days ago, I was telling the Spocklette about the CB/Trucking movies, songs and TV shows in the 70's/.

I had actually thought of posting on "Hello, I'm a Truck" as one of the weirdest song beginnings.

I couldn't get her to listen to "Teddy Bear" -the sad song about the crippled boy talking on the CB. I tear up a little every time I hear the song.

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Re: RIP C.W. McCall

#4 Post by SportsFan68 » Sun Apr 03, 2022 9:29 pm

We have Narrow Gauge Days in our part of the country around Memorial Day, with the main feature these days a "race" between bicycles costing more than my first car and -- you guessed it -- a narrow gauge train. It's not much of a race. Top bicyclists finish within 10 minutes of two hours, and the train is constrained by the dictates of the Federal Railroad Administration, even if they wanted to try to beat two hours by risking a multi-million dollar operation and the lives of everybody on board.

OK, back to CW McCall -- The Silverton Train is my second-favorite song of his, and here's a YouTube URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9ZlLrRzTNw

The man himself was on board for Narrow Gauge Days in either 1981 or 1982, can't find the date.

And my favorite McCall song -- Wolf Creek Pass. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHeDQpuA3KM

I have the album, if I could find it. Love the guy . . .
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Re: RIP C.W. McCall

#5 Post by silverscreenselect » Sun Apr 03, 2022 9:53 pm

SportsFan68 wrote:
Sun Apr 03, 2022 9:29 pm

OK, back to CW McCall -- The Silverton Train is my second-favorite song of his, and here's a YouTube URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9ZlLrRzTNw
Before I met Mrs. SSS, I took a two week trip out West in the early 1980s that included the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam, Zion, and Bryce Canyon. On the way back, I spent two nights in Durango and spent one of those days taking the Durango-Silverton train. It's as spectacular a trip as you're ever going to see. At times, you can look out the window and see way, way down. Oddly, the one thing I remember was seeing a large animal, either an elk or a moose, that had somehow slid partway down the edge of the canyon and was standing on a narrow ledge. It had no way to go forward or backward and the if it went over the side, it was a long way down. The train goes up to the town of Silverton which was pretty much of a tourist stop turnaround where you spend an hour or so, eat and shop, and then come back. On the way back, which was probably about four hours later, the animal was still in the same spot. I still wonder if anyone was able to rescue it or something bad eventually happened.

By the way, on the other day I was in Durango, I took a rafting trip on the Animas River, which goes through downtown Durango before eventually flowing into the Colorado. There had been a very heavy snowfall that winter, and I was there the week before Memorial Day, so the snow was still melting and the rivers were very high and fast. We hit a pothole in the river and we passengers went up in the air and when we came down, the raft wasn't there anymore. I learned very quickly that the water was verrrry cold. Fortunately, there were about a half dozen people in the raft and we were all fairly young and in decent shape (even me back then), so we got to the riverbank okay. The only problem was that the guide had been the only person left in the raft and he steered it to the other bank. It would have been pretty tough to cross the river again in that current, but fortunately, he was close to one of the bridges over the river. So, he was able to get the raft out of the water, cross the bridge, and come back to where we were to pick us up. Ironically, he'd been talking about an excursion he led a week earlier that included some elderly Japanese tourists who had a great time. I wondered what would have happened if that raft had gone in the river.
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Re: RIP C.W. McCall

#6 Post by SportsFan68 » Sun Apr 03, 2022 10:15 pm

silverscreenselect wrote:
Sun Apr 03, 2022 9:53 pm
SportsFan68 wrote:
Sun Apr 03, 2022 9:29 pm

OK, back to CW McCall -- The Silverton Train is my second-favorite song of his, and here's a YouTube URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9ZlLrRzTNw
Before I met Mrs. SSS, I took a two week trip out West in the early 1980s that included the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam, Zion, and Bryce Canyon. On the way back, I spent two nights in Durango and spent one of those days taking the Durango-Silverton train. It's as spectacular a trip as you're ever going to see. At times, you can look out the window and see way, way down. Oddly, the one thing I remember was seeing a large animal, either an elk or a moose, that had somehow slid partway down the edge of the canyon and was standing on a narrow ledge. It had no way to go forward or backward and the if it went over the side, it was a long way down. The train goes up to the town of Silverton which was pretty much of a tourist stop turnaround where you spend an hour or so, eat and shop, and then come back. On the way back, which was probably about four hours later, the animal was still in the same spot. I still wonder if anyone was able to rescue it or something bad eventually happened.

By the way, on the other day I was in Durango, I took a rafting trip on the Animas River, which goes through downtown Durango before eventually flowing into the Colorado. There had been a very heavy snowfall that winter, and I was there the week before Memorial Day, so the snow was still melting and the rivers were very high and fast. We hit a pothole in the river and we passengers went up in the air and when we came down, the raft wasn't there anymore. I learned very quickly that the water was verrrry cold. Fortunately, there were about a half dozen people in the raft and we were all fairly young and in decent shape (even me back then), so we got to the riverbank okay. The only problem was that the guide had been the only person left in the raft and he steered it to the other bank. It would have been pretty tough to cross the river again in that current, but fortunately, he was close to one of the bridges over the river. So, he was able to get the raft out of the water, cross the bridge, and come back to where we were to pick us up. Ironically, he'd been talking about an excursion he led a week earlier that included some elderly Japanese tourists who had a great time. I wondered what would have happened if that raft had gone in the river.
What a great trip! Hope I can get SteelersFan out to those locations if I can get him to retire and go to places where he can't hunt anything, or go fishing.

It was almost certainly an elk. Although moose were reintroduced to the Colorado Rocky Mountains in 1978, they didn't show up in the general population this far south until the last five years or so. And he almost certainly made it safely down, they're very sure footed.

What a great rafting adventure you had! You officially became swimmers. That's what would have happened to the Japanese visitors if they'd gone into the drink. I'm glad they didn't -- an older gentleman with a heart condition went into the Arkansas River in springtime and died of a heart attack before they could get him out. The Japanese are generally healthier than we are though, so they probably woulda been OK anyway.

SteelersFan also went into the water on an Arkansas rapid, and by the time the guide in the raft ahead of us pulled him out, I was starting to panic. He was fine -- no problem, he said. He joked that he heard me yell, "Where are the car keys?" and "Where's the insurance policy?!" Ha ha.
-- In Iroquois society, leaders are encouraged to remember seven generations in the past and consider seven generations in the future when making decisions that affect the people.
-- America would be a better place if leaders would do more long-term thinking. -- Wilma Mankiller

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Re: RIP C.W. McCall

#7 Post by Bob Juch » Mon Apr 04, 2022 8:19 am

I've been over Wolf Creek Pass twice, first in 1976 and second in 2006. The first time I was in my camper van and heading downhill, I exceeded the speed limit to save my brakes. As I reached the bottom, a patrolman stood in the middle of the road and flagged me over to a wide dirt turnout. He asked me why I was going so fast, and I explained that my van was heavy and I didn't want to burn out my brakes. He accepted that and let me go. I also visited Durango on both trips.
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.
- Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001)

Si fractum non sit, noli id reficere.

Teach a child to be polite and courteous in the home and, when he grows up, he'll never be able to drive in New Jersey.

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