Dick Kroeckel, Ragtime Pianist (September 6, 1945 – October 11, 2020)

Hey all. I received late word that Colorado ragtime pianist Dick Kroeckel passed away, back in October.  

Dick was a well-known entertainer, mentioned in the same breath as Max Morath and Danny Griffith. Born in Indiana, at the age of six, his family moved to Colorado. His piano playing was influenced by musical family members, along with Little Richard. He started playing professionally, at the age of 16 years old, at the Screwball Bar, in Kittredge. He soon became part of the Central City Colorado Summer Fun, playing at the historic Tollgate and Glory Hole Bars. 

After completing his military service, he moved to Georgetown, where he was hired as a bartender at the Silver Queen, where he spent the next five years. In the 1970s he moved to the Cherry Creek Inn, Red Slipper Room in Denver.  He soon took to the road, performing in the southwest and Midwest states.

 

The New Mexican (Santa Fe) - March 20, 1974

 

La Crosse Tribune (La Crosse, Wisconsin) - September 5, 1975

In 1976, Dick was asked to perform on an episode of ‘On The Road’ with Charles Kuralt on the CBS Evening News. That same year, he appeared in Estes Park with the Al Fike Show. 

In 1977 he released his album Echoes From Lulu White's Mahogany Hall. The album also features drummer Steve Ashton, who was a music teacher for Denver Public Schools (he now performs in the polka trio, The Rhinelanders).

I have another copy of this record, showing a little girl on the cover.

In his later years Kroeckel performed nightly at the Diamond Belle Saloon, at the Strater Hotel, in Durango.  

During the 1980s, he took a job as a brakeman on the Durango & Silverton narrow gauge railroad. He soon returned to Central City, and in 1987, was back to entertaining audiences again.

In the 1990s he was found playing for audiences at the Phenix Club, in Cripple Creek.

Colorado Springs Gazette-Telegraph - October 4, 1991

According to the liner notes of his album, Dick would end each show with the song "Three O'clock in the Morning," signaling that the show was coming to an end. "I hope this record will be your ticket to happy listening," he writes.

Listen to "Three O'clock in the Morning"

Silver Slipper Saloon owner Lanning Likes (1944-2019)

So yesterday, I'm doing my normal ritual - hitting up the estate sales in town, when I drive up to a wonderful two story home, near downtown Denver. The line was stretched around the front, which is always a good sign.

What caught me as odd, as soon as I walked in, I found several pieces of memorabilia, from the Silver Slipper Saloon, in Central City. Then, I noticed a huge stack of records, all from artists who had some connection to the Gilpin County town.

So I'm immediately thinking, "Is this the estate sale of someone who had something to do with the Silver Slipper?" I Googled the address, and did a bit of detective work, and discovered I was in the former home of Lanning Likes, the owner and operator of the bar, from 1968-1978, and who passed away, last summer.

According to his obituary, Mr. Likes was born in Lamar, in 1944, to Dr. Edwin C. Likes and Juanita Likes.  After graduating from Lamar High School in 1962, he attended college at Tulane University and Southern California University, receiving a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of Denver. He began studying for a law degree but stopped just short, to start his own business - as owner and operator of the Silver Slipper Saloon in Central City.

After he left the Saloon, in 1978, he moved to Denver, where he became a licensed stockbroker.

Among the stack of records, I found this tape of the original Silver Slipper musical opening (sadly, my reel-to-reel player died, so I can't supply audio, at this time. Will post when I get it dubbed off).

Several Colorado singers performed in Central City, while Mr. Likes was the Slipper's owner, and he had apparently kept copies of their vinyl recordings. I found a large stack of an Ozie Waters picture sleeve single, even I had never seen, the Verne Partlow-penned, "Old Man Atom." This re-recorded single was originally released, by Ozie, on the Coral label, in 1950. The single below features Harvey Gosman on fiddle, and Gill Blagg on bass (it also appears on Ozie's Central City Favorites albums, which were recorded at the Silver Slipper).

I bought the entire batch.

Listen to "Old Man Atom"

 

Waters, who was a cowboy movie star. and Denver TV personality, was a regular Central City performer. He also recorded the albums, Central City Favorites.  He was later elected town marshal.  He passed away in 1978, in Central City.

 Photo of Ozie Waters, outside the Silver Slipper Saloon 

(click on picture to see the original menu, in the window, which is also pictured at the estate sale)

Around that same time, CD Draper was a regular at Earl's Toll Gate - another Central City area hangout.  Among the estate sale collection, I found a stack of Curtain Call records, (CD Draper's homemade label) including those by Joe Diamond and Lois Lane.

 

While I didn't need to duplicate the albums being offered at the sale, there was also an impressive offering of Central City-related albums, including those by Draper, The Gilded Garter house band Band on the Bar Room Floor, and two Ozie Waters LPs.

Interesting note, on the CD Draper LP, CD Draper Featuring Crisser, Tom Likes (Lanning's brother) is listed as percussionist. 

According to David Forsyth, the executive director and curator of the Gilpin County Historical Society, the Silver Slipper changed hands, after Mr. Likes left, and eventually closed, in the 1990s (the building is now part of the Bonanza casino. The original Silver Slipper mural, shown in the Lanning Likes picture at the top of the blog, is still there). 

My thanks to the Likes family, for keeping these records safe, and allowing them to be purchased, so they may be preserved. 

C.D. Draper

Listen to a sample

Earl Waibel interviewed January 2013.

As the Super Bowl is this Sunday, I thought now would be a good time, if any, to feature the single "Super Bowl Game of Love," from Denver's Curtain Call label - the vanity label for C.D. Draper.

Curtain Call Discography:

3565 -   C. Dean Draper and the Outriders  - "We" / "The House of Love"(1965)
35671 - C. Dean Draper - "You're Touching Me" / "Bright Lights and Blues" (1965)
35691 - Gary Dean - "Gary's Melody" / "Bright Lights and Blues" (1965)
35691 - C. Dean Draper - "I'm the Only Hippie in Muskogee" (year unknown)
35701 - C. Dean Draper - "Walk Back Through My Mind" / "The Most Successful Failure in the World"  (1965)

The Most Successful Failure in the World

Curtain Call LP 372498

Curtain Call was pretty prolific in 1965, however I can find nothing released by the label for the next six years.  Then, in 1971, Draper and Curtain Call surfaced again, with the release the LP See the Eagle Die for Running Bear. That same year, Billboard mentioned that "C. Dean Draper and group just finished a stand with Doug Kershaw at Marvelous Merv's in Denver." Also in 1971, Draper would write "California Oakie," which Buck Owens would cover a few years later.

Around that same time, Draper hooked up with the house band, performing in Central City, at Earl's Toll Gate.

"I had been working there, commuting back and forth from Denver," said Earl Waibel, who played with Draper in the Toll Gate house band, and was somewhat of a Central City band veteran, previously playing at Gilded Garter.

Earl Waibel (on keyboards) performing 

at the Gilded Garter, Central City (1968)

In 1971, the summer tourist season ended, and the work in Central City dried up, so Waibel and Draper began looking for gigs in Denver.  They eventually regrouped as the house band at the 400 Club, a strip joint in downtown Denver.

"We always had a few Denver Broncos players drop by," Waibel said.  "But I won't reveal their names."

One Sunday, after a football game, an audience member requested a song about the sport.

"Everyone knew "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" was the consummate baseball song, but there was really no song anyone could identify with for football."

For Waibel, the timing was perfect.

"I had actually been working on a song about football, so I said 'I have a song,' and so I sang it.  The audience had lots to drink, and though it was funny."

Draper saw the reaction and, being ever the marketer, saw an opportunity.

"He pressured me to finish it, so he could record it," Waibel said.  "It took about a year for me to do it."

Recorded in 1973, "Super Bowl Game of Love" was performed by Lois Lane, a Waco, Texas country singer, working in Colorado, who had previously toured with Tex Ritter, Red Foley, Flatt and Scruggs, and numerous other country luminaries (Lane was inducted in the Colorado Country Music Hall of Fame in 2000).  

(Note above Waibel's name is misspelled)
Draper marketed the record around the country, but the single failed to see the enthusiasm shown at The 400 Club.

"It won 'Pick of the Week." on a Nevada radio station," said Waibel. "I received a royalty check for $3.87, but that was it."

 Draper would go on to re-release Super Bowl Game of Love (year unknown) with singer Chris Taylor (b-side "We")...and he still misspelled the songwriter's name.

Draper would later release the LP Bright Lights, Blues and Lonely Memories - C.D. Draper and Crisser (Chris Taylor?).

Earl Waibel would leave country music to join the dixieland band The Boomtown Stompers. He went on to become an accountant. He has since retired, in Denver.