Last Friday, my old buddy, John Ellis came down from Greenville for lunch. You might remember him as Johnny Ellis on WNOK from the days when I was at WCOS. I haven’t seen John in over 40 years so we had a lot of catching up to do. We worked at a lot of the same radio and television stations but somehow never at the same time. It’s funny how life is sometimes.
So we sat down to a pair of California Dreaming salads and talked television and radio. And of course the two iconic drive in restaurants where we did shows from our respective stations. And that brought up more food discussions.
Thank you Fluffy Cat for letting us crash "The Litterbox" Show Despite his long and illustrious radio career, John had not set foot in a radio studio for many years, so we decided to pay a visit to WUSC-FM after lunch. As it turns out, John was the technician in charge of WUSC-FM during the last days of WUSC-AM. The FM station was a 10 watt classical music station back in those days and was unassociated with WUSC AM. It was located in the Claire Towers that was located in the same block as the Cornell Arms Apartments where WCOS AM/FM was in the 60s. With ensuing frequency shifts and other changes, WUSC FM is now a Class A FM Station running at 2,500 watts broadcasting from a transmitter atop a dormitory at the University of South Carolina five blocks east of the old studio and transmitter. Like WUSC-AM was back in the day it is now a part of Student Media, operated by the student body, staff, faculty and alumni.
While visiting with the students on the air we shared stories of the wild crazy things that happened on the air at the drive in restaurants. Stories were shared that involved patrons who had one beer too many, monkeys going ape on the air and the Hells Angels just to name a few. I am not sure whether the stories encouraged the student DJs to want careers in radio or to scare them off forever. Both John and I were amazed at the depth of knowledge the students had of the music that we played. That was way cool!!
OK – I need to get to the point, this is about college food. Back in the day, the dining hall in Russell House where WUSC is located was a typical cafeteria complete with metal trays and servers in hairnets asking “what you want.” These days we call that fare “meat and three” down here in the south. And there are a few restaurants that have a great business cooking and selling those wonderful memories.
After John and I visited the studio, instead of taking the elevator down to the first floor to back to where my car was parked, we took the stairs down to the second floor so I could show John the dining facilities available to the students these days. What a difference from the days we ate in that same space. The long serving rows and the stacks of trays are gone. In their place are small vending areas similar to what you see in a shopping mall food court or an airport terminal. Chinese, Italian, Greek – any kind of food you want is available. Chick-Fil-A, Pei Wei and Panera Bread are all choices in the newly renovated area. There is even a small meat and three near the back door. I’m sure that one of these vendors honors the old USC tradition, Chicken Tender Wednesdays though. If not, then it is a sad day in the history of the University.
John and I wondered if the USDA is thrilled at this change, but it seems to be definitely a hit with the students. Even the health food vendor had lines at their counters at 3 in the afternoon. I started to comment that I would have missed the old cafeteria until I remembered that in my second semester as a sophomore, I opted out of the food plan and bought my meals one at a time. The reason for that was a local restaurant sitting catty-corner from my dorm. The “Kollege Korner” served the best hamburgers and I ate more than my share of them, usually one a day and on really good days two, one for lunch and one for dinner. Hey it was a lot closer to my dorm than the cafeteria was! And to boot, I could keep an eye on my clothes spinning in the coin operated washing machine in the cleaners next door while eating.
I suppose you can thank WUSC for keeping my diet a little more balanced. I spent a lot of my spare time in the station and usually a small group of us DJs would catch lunch or dinner in the cafeteria that shared Russell House with us. Yes Mom, I did eat my vegetables.
All this talk about hamburgers has me remembering the best of the best hamburgers in my personal history. In High School my favorites were Penny Burgers and Krystals. In college those old Kollege Korner burgers were the top of the pops with me; a 4 inch diameter thin beef patty on a white fluffy bun with mustard, fresh cut and diced onions, lettuce and tomato. During my WCOS days, similar burgers could be found at Gene Long’s Cornell Arms Pharmacy the floor below our studios and Doug Broom’s “Big Joy” delivered by a smiling car hop on roller skates to my booth at the beginning of each show. My favorite burger today is a Pimento Burger at Rockaway’s on Rosewood. It has to come with a side dish of pimento cheese fries and a Coca-Cola to be complete. Only these days, I have to share half of the burger and fries with a friend and the Coke is a diet coke. Oh yes – I can do that only about once a year. Every time I take that first bite, I close my eyes and I’m sitting in a booth at Doug’s next to Scotty Quick and across from Sam the Sham watching him take that first bite. Aaaaoooouuuuuugh! Yes – Sam left his turban in his purple hearse. Oh MY!
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