The Day Mike Thomson Met Gary Vaness. As told by Gary.

This a true story based on my memories of the day.

I was a beautiful sunny afternoon in 1970. Likely sometime in August.

Jim Rademacher was closing on a home a bought that morning. 

The home was going to be filled with six or eight people who attended UWGB. One of them was me. Several people were going live in an old school bus parked along side of the garage. Jim’s brother Wayne was also going to live there.

The house was on Bay Settlement Road on the Niagara Escarpment overlooking the bay of Green Bay. Several miles to the north of the campus. Great view.

Well, me being me, decided to throw a party the first night to celebrate.

I picked up a of barrel of beer and all the fixings and headed down Bay Settlement Road.  I was driving my 1959 Buick convertible with the top  down. It was white with a red interior. I was wearing my favorite white Panama hat. My car broke down in the middle of the road.

Along comes Wayne Rademacher in his Volkswagen hatchback.

We decided to first rescue the beer and put it in his hatchback.  

Then we manually turned the front wheels on my car toward the  ditch and gave  it a shove.

We drove about half a mile further and then Wayne’s car broke down. We were in trouble.

A car appeared out of l nowhere. It was a white Buick Vista Cruiser. I remember it had so many windows I half expected to Pope to step out of it. 

It was Mike Thomson to save a day. We didn’t know each other then he was just a stranger passing by.

It didn’t take much convincing to put the barrel of beer in his car and the beer made it to the party.

It was early afternoon and things were starting out slow and steady so we just decided to retrieve Wayne’s car.  

Three or four guys volunteered to push the car the half mile down the road to the house.  We enlisted a girl to steer, I remember her last name was Parrish, then she confessed. “I don’t know how to drive.” and we thought who cares just steer.

We got that car moving full steam ahead. When we approached the downhill driveway we hollered for her to turn and if she did. Right down in the driveway probably about 50 feet to the garage.

It was a single car garage. The door was wide open. The garage was empty. We probably should’ve taught her to use the brakes.  

She ran full speed ahead into the left front corner of the wall and knocked the wall right off its foundation. The wall fell down and then the garage door fell on the car. We were able to rescue the girl unharmed.  

The party had officially started.  

There were probably 30 of us or so throughout the night some brought food some brought drugs. I’m sure massive amounts of pot was smoked. I don’t think Mike knew anyone at the party to start but he knew most of them later.

At some point in the middle of the night, we were dancing in the dining room and the house was rocking in the chandelier, fell off ceiling and smashed the floor. It was like an omen. This was gonna be a good house to party in.  

It was early afternoon the next day and Mike was still there. I knew we were gonna make great friends.