To tape or not to tape.....my unofficial job and facing the unexpected

In my last post, I talked about my three jobs while I was in school. I delivered furniture, I worked in a hobby shop and I was on the assembly line making ammo boxes for the military but there was a forth job that maybe took more time and led me down a strange path than all the other three put together....and I was working for myself. Most of you will be to young to remember what I'm getting ready to talk about.

It all started out very innocently in the mid-60's when a Muntz stereo store opened on Broadway Ave. in San Antonio. If you wanted to make sure your car would stand out, you had to have three things...cool wheels or wheel covers, tinted glass (not like what we have today) and a cool stereo system. Before Muntz came along, all you had in your car was a radio. Earl Muntz invented the first tape player for the car. It was a stand alone 4-track tape deck. You would hook it up, usually under your dash board and connect to you OEM speakers. If you were really cool and had the money, you would get a custom installation and get an upgraded speaker system. Most kids didn't have that because it was so expensive but at least they could afford the deck.

Of course, I had to have one of these cool 4-track decks as soon as I could so I went to the Muntz store to get one installed. The deck played specially designed 4-track tapes....the forerunner to the cassette tapes that all of us remember. Yes, for you purists, there was an 8-track developed that put an end to the 4-track and it came before the cassette. The 4-track tapes at the time could only be bought at the Muntz store so it was like the razor blade/razor style of marketing. If you bought the deck, then you had to come back to Muntz to buy the tapes...a least for awhile.

One day, my buddy Jim and I were in the Muntz store when they were putting on display a new Muntz model #330. This was a 4-track tape player/RECORDER and a record turntable all in one package with speakers. What you could do now was buy a blank tape, put it in the machine...put a LP record on the record player and tape the record to the 4-track blank. Well, it was cheaper to make your own tapes than to buy them so the cost of this combo package could be justified. This model #330 cost almost $400, a lot of money back then.

 I looked at Jim and he looked at me and we both had the same idea...let's buy this machine, make these tapes and we would have the latest albums on tape long before they ever hit the market in 4-track tape form. When the record companies released the new LP's, they waited to put it on tape because most record companies did not think that this new tape playing system would last. They thought it was a fad.

 I was making good money at my jobs but I didn't have $400 so I waited for my dad to come home that night so I could ask him if I could borrow the $400 for this tape machine. I promised to pay him back within 6 months. Since my dad was in electronics and understood the value of what I was asking for, he went ahead and loaned me the $400. He made me sign a contract promising to pay him back in 6 months. If I did get him paid back in the allotted time, the loan would be interest free, if not, then I would have to pay him interest on the whole $400. He was trying to teach me a life lesson here.

Well, I went to the store, bought the unit and some extra blank tapes. The first record I remember recording was the new Paul Revere and the Raiders album. I taped one for me and one for Jim. I also taped the Beatles and Rolling Stones newest albums at the same time, for both of us. Well, that Friday night we headed to the Frontier Drive-In, our local hang out. Of course, we played our music loud and we wanted to show off our new custom made 4-track tapes. I remember playing the Paul Revere tape in Jim's car...he had a tape deck too...when some of our friends walked over and ask, how did we get the new Paul Revere album on 4-track tape already. We told them that we taped it ourselves. Little did we know that night but a new job was born. Some of our friends asked us if we would make tapes for them. Initially, I said no because I didn't think I had the time and I wanted Jim and I to be the only ones with the latest music on tape. We thought it added to our popularity and somehow made us cooler than we already were...something way more important to Jim than me.... because he loved the girls and he was a good looking dude...a surfer type that had all the girls hanging all over him. Jim was fun to be around because he thought he was God's gift to women, and by the looks of all the women around him....he was.....and since I was his best friend...I was cool too (only by association!!). Even my sister thought he was "cute".

 Well, over the next couple of weeks, we got lots of requests to make tapes for all of our friends...they were offering all kinds of things, including money, for us to make tapes for them. Everybody wanted to trade for something...car parts, free labor, money of course, just about anything and yes, even drugs. You have to remember....hard drugs were not yet on the scene in the mid-60's (at least not in our group). There was LSD, marijuana, mushrooms, peyote, mescaline and other assorted "soft" drugs. Of course, the girls also had their own special talents to barter with. It got so bad, that these girls boyfriends would ask them to do us "special favors" if we would make them some tapes. IT WAS STARTING TO GET CRAZY!!.

After all this craziness, Jim and I decided that hey, why pass up this opportunity to make a little money...let's start making tapes for our friends but lets set some ground rules. We decided that we would only take cash payments for the tapes we made or we would barter for things that we knew we could easily sell...car parts, records, anything other kids would buy. We also decided that we would not take drugs or girlfriends as payment. Both were way to dangerous to get involved in. Just a side note here...Jim's sister worked for the San Antonio District Attorney so we had to keep our noses relatively clean.  

 Well, we started making these tapes, the more we made them the more we would be asked to do. Unfortunately, our friends would tell their friends and their friends would tell their friends and on and on it would go. Before long we were making tapes for all kinds of people. We had such a high profile that the San Antonio police, the Alamo Heights police and the Terrell Hills police were watching our every move. We couldn't drive up and down Austin Hwy or Broadway without police cars following us around. Did it look like we were dealing drugs, yes it did since we were selling stuff out of the trunks of our cars. But the police knew what we were doing...it was legal (kind of) and we even had some policemen buying tapes from us.

This whole thing was getting out of control. We had our friends, friends of our friends, people we didn't know, soldiers (remember, Jim's father was Commanding General at a very large military base), WAC's, kids from the South Side of San Antonio...people from everywhere wanting us to make tapes and offering us tons of stuff to pay us with. Eventually, these people got my telephone number and my parents address. We had phone calls and front door visits at all hours. My parents were getting fed up plus our garage was filling up with all kinds of bartered stuff. Finally my mother put her foot down and said no more. She was tired of all the late night phone calls and front door visits from people none of us knew...especially if I wasn't home. I would stay up all night, every night from about 10pm to 6 or 7am recording as many tapes as I could...I could usually get 10 to 12 made in one session.

There is a song lyric in the Beach Boy's song "I Get Around"....that says...."the bad guys know and they leave us alone". That was so true for us. The bad guys left us alone because they wanted us to make tapes for them. At one point, we knew every bad guy on the Northside of San Antonio and even some Southside bad guys.

 Here is just one of hundreds of examples of us getting asked to make tapes. Jim and I were in the Frontier one Saturday night in Jim's car. This hot conversion van pulls in...all tinted up so you couldn't see inside. This beautiful woman gets out of the passenger side. She had the most amazing figure, wearing a halter top, short shorts and CFM heels. She walked over to our car and ask "who is Andy_____?" I said I was and she asked me to come over to the van and talk to her boyfriend. I asked if it was about making him some tapes but she wouldn't answer me, just come over and talk to her boyfriend (btw, this kind of stuff was happening to us all the time). Jim and I proceeded to get out of the car when she told Jim to stay put, just me. I really didn't like not having my back up with me but since I was in a drive-in where EVERYBODY knew me and EVERYBODY was watching me...I thought, OK...I will be safe. Anyway, I walked over to the van to the drivers side window and this guy rolls down his window and tells me to get in on the passenger side. I entered the van...closed the door and proceeded to see a FULL GROWN LION in the back seat of the van. I was scared shitless but this guy assured me it was only a pet and everything would be alright. He went ahead and ask if I would make him some tapes and I proceeded on as if everything was normal. He was willing to pay me more than my asking price because he wanted a bunch of tapes made and he was in a hurry. By the way, this guy turned out to be the largest supplier of marijuana in South Texas. He also became a good friendand one hell of a customer (and hey, I wasn't going to tell him no!!)...at least until he went to jail. Yes, he did offer me the opportunity to sell drugs for him because he saw and knew of my now huge customer base. He was willing to pay me a ton of money but I said no thanks...I wouldn't even do referrals for him...I really wanted to keep him and his friends at arms length...I was happy in my little corner of the world. This was just one example of the many strange experiences that Jim and I had during this time of making tapes. I could be anywhere in the city and because both my car and Jim's car was so recognizable...complete strangers would walk up to us and ask if we were Andy _______ or Jim _______. What a weird position to be in.

I want to mention here that Jim and I had another real good friend. His name was Big Jon. He was 6'4" and weighed over 300 pounds...he was all muscle. Not only was he our best friend, he was also our protection. Nobody would even think of messing with us, whether Jon was with us or not. Jon played football for Texas A&M and got drafted by the Dallas Cowboys but he was in a horrible auto accident and could never play football again. I wish I could locate him now!! I have really tried to reconnect with both Jim and Jon but to no avail. I have found some other friends off of Classmates who remember Jim and I and our time in the late 60's. I'm hoping they will add some of their memories of all of our times together.

I could probably write a book about this whole experience. Needless to say, this whole thing got WAY, WAY, WAY out of hand so in about 18 months, we decided to shut it down and go back to how we started. We just bought the current album, made a bunch of tapes off that album and proceeded to sell those tapes out of the trunk of our cars on Friday and Saturday nights.

OH YES, I PAID OFF MY FATHER IN LESS THAN 30 DAYS!!!!!!!