What a gift to have met and then be offered friendship with the beautiful ones. Living in the Forty Acres of musicians neighborhood, Jack found himself with room mates that still astonish him decades later.

Bill Hinkley and Judy Larson took me under their wing and taught me well about music and love. The romance of Kismet. Poets with guitars and a mandolin, Coleridge and Tennyson did not anticipate these two.

A gentleness with much laughter and brilliance. Together they astonished people coast to coast. The little coffee houses, the folk music cafe’s. Platforms and postage stamp stages. It was the same show every time. The musical score was different from place to place, but the humor and duet solidity was always the same. They got invited back all the time. It was a dance with romance that never grew old, for all of us and them too.

I was invited along on a road trip with them, way back in the early 70’s. That’s a bit over 50 years ago in the last century if you like doing math while reading. Small town colleges were a significant place to perform on the trip. From Indiana to Pennsylvania and then way up in northern New York state to finish off. Four of us in the old four door. Myself, Mike Cass and Bill and Judy. The trunk had a few small packs of personal “stage clothing” (no cowboy hats) and a few changes of underwear. The rest of the trunk was instrument cases lined up. Fender to fender with guitars, mandolins, a dobro, several fiddles and a pedal steel.

We ate at Campus’ lunchrooms (Whittenberg in Ohio was the best) and made do with sleeping quarters. Often the sleeping bags were used on the living room floors of the friendly families that arranged the bookings. No extra money for a motel. Air B&B was not even a concept and hotels had good water pressure with room costs to match.

It was a grand time and music poured out like anointed oil upon this rag-tag quartet. Gas was cheap and the car didn’t use any oil either. There were tips from impromptu sidewalk venues and generous amounts of coffee and sandwiches from club owners. We ate well and for the most part, played well. Plenty of obscure folk and country blues songs that resonated with us and the young folks that go to those sorts of places.

There were ‘green rooms’ at some of the clubs which was a luxury. We shared one with Lauden Wainwright in upstate New York. Louden kept playing the jukebox when we were tuning up. At least it had a bathroom with a door.

Travel had it’s moments. Stopped by the New York state troopers we needed ID’s. I had lost my wallet in Ohio but did have a student guest pass for the lunchroom. “I’d hate to tell you what to do with that piece of paper sir” I always remember my military number and that did the trick. We were asked if we had any weapons or knives and Cass offered up his military can opener. It’s call a P38. Holsters were at hand when it came out of Mikes pocket. It wasn’t a Walser 9mm pistol much to everyone’s relief.

When Bill was dying at the VA (he was fluent in Japanese. Hush hush stuff) I stood on his right and Jim Tordoff, an excellent banjo player, stood on his left. We prayed and told him, if it works this way, we would like him to meet us when it’s our turn. Meet us with that Lloyd Lohr Gibson with gold tuners. We can then go worship the risen Lord forever together.

Kiss the son indeed. We loved Bill and Judy, still do. It’s pretty good. Norman Peterson / Jack Gator