Allan Johnson (AJ) was the perfect roommate. He never complained. We never had an argument. He worked nights at Emerson, I worked days at the radio station so about the only time we saw each other was at one of the countless parties we hosted.

Ann Hicklin is married now with a different last name but this record is about then not now. Anne was very smart… she always drove a great car… and she never took any shit from me.

Barb Miltenberger won my heart at Tommy’s North End Cafe. She was a 19-year-old coed at the University of Arkansas, home for the weekend. Pam Pylant brought her and some other girls to the North End and we fell in love at the bowling machine.

Buddy Peck was a mystery to me. I don’t know what to say about him. He’s Carol’s twin. He was rumored to be in military intelligence. He invented something that’s used in drilling oil wells. Buddy may just have to be an empty footnote in The Basement Diaries.

Carol Peck (Buddy’s twin) has to be included here because she is part of the Peck Family. She was off doing grown-up things as The Basement Diaries were being written. Best known for allowing her pre-school children to fetch us beers.

Carol Sue was one of Allan’s girl friends. You’ll see her in several of the pictures throughout. She had a bird that died because the furnace in the house in which she was living malfunctioned. Allan and I riffed for an entire evening on this event (“Do you think he stripped down to his little bird jockey shorts at the mercury climbed?” “Did he drop his canteen in the sand and struggle over the next dune?”) I don’t think Carol Sue ever forgave us. Nor should she.

Charlie was the only Peck not a twin. Charlie was the smartest, the funniest, probably the best of us all.

Don Del-uh-creet-ez (nobody has a clue how he spelled his name) lived in a little Air Stream trailer he rented from Jim Bob’s mom. He later moved to a larger trailer he rented from Jim Bob’s mom. We packed an amazing number of people into those trailers. Don was older than us but I was never sure how much older. No matter, he was certainly part of the group. The one thing everybody always seems to remember about Don is that in one of his trailers, the toilet was not in a separate room, but right beside his bed. He could reach out and touch it. I’ll try to tell you more about Don in the Parties section.

Don and Suzy Akers were the headliners at the Shilo Lounge in Kennett. Don grew up in Kennett and became a musician. He met Suzy in Florida where his band was performing and somehow convinced her to return with them to Kennett. Going to the Shilo to watch Don and the band perform became something of ritual. The Shilo was also the scene of many Fooz Ball Death Matches.

Jan Miltenberger is Barb’s older sister. I was much more aware of Jan in high school than Barb but I was playing AAA ball and she was starting in The Bigs. Jan gained notoriety for her readings of Penthouse Forum letters.

Jane Marshall. Lifeguard, stand-up comic, philosopher.

Jim Bob is James now, I believe. Always top of his class. Best known for showing up with half a bottle of wine he knew no one would drink… helping himself to the beer… and then taking his half-a-bottle of wine home. Jim Bob always knew he wanted to be a doctor.

Joanne Peck is RP’s twin. I’m sure the first time I heard her name spoken aloud, it was RP shouting (“Jooo-aaaaa–nnn!”) for her to bring him something from the kitchen. It’s somehow typical of Joanne that few were as present in The Basement Diaries as she, but I’m hard pressed to describe her. I think Rebecca might be the person person to tell you about Joanne.

Joe Browning was always an artist. He became an architect. And accidental intellectual. He’s the only person I know that looks good with a beard. He only speaks when he has something worth saying. I’ve held Joe upright while he peed next to his back door. (“No, there’s no problem Mr. Browning…Joe will be right in.”) Joe used to run away when he got drunk.

John Robison had discipline. In college, John would go straight home after his last class and read his assignments and study for the mid-term still a few months off. John became a bank examiner but gave it up to return to Kennett. John could party like a Recon Ranger and then just vanish from a crowded room. John always seemed like a grown-up to me.

Dennis Kackley was one of my college roommates. He was from St. Louis and so –by definition– somewhat strange and exotic. Dennis made an art of pessimism. A high school friend of his, Mike Smith, lived with us on Flint Hill Road. It was like living with Steven Wright and Cosmo Kramer.

Kathy, Karen and Sheila Horton; Vickie and Penny French. I know it’s not fair to lump these ladies together but that’s how I remember them. Sort of a Northeast Arkansas Tactical Response Team. I can’t remember how they became part of The Basement Diaries. And it’s not important. They added important depth to our gene pool and they made us laugh.

Larry Joe Thomason shared RP’s love of guns and poker. Except Larry Joe actually hunted things. He drifted back to Kennett (from the Army) about the time the rest of us did. Larry Joe’s creative streak ran a little deeper than most. Excellent photographer (let’s hope he contributes to this effort). Deep thinker. Deadly poker player.

Marcy Fern Smith was one of Joanne’s college roommates. I’m not sure where Marcy was from but I remember her as weird in that late sixties sort of way. Free-spirited before there was such an expression.

Mays. You know all you need or care to know about me from these pages. I chose this image because this is how I see myself during the latter part of The Basement Diaries. If there is one place where I’ve logged more time in a chair than in front of this computer, it was in the control room at KBOA. From July, 1972, until May, 1984, nothing –before or since– has been as much fun.

Mullen. I always think Larry Mullen as half of a team. Mullen and Miller. Leigh and Larry. Mullen missed a few key years of The Basement Diaries because he dropped out of college and got drafted. He was in Vietnam but never talked about it. At least, not to me. He was good a poker but not particularly lucky. He was almost without peer at a pool table. He assisted RP in abusing Joanne.

Mike Neely grew up next door to me and then moved to California. And as if to once again demonstrate the strange and powerful pull Kennett seemed to have, Mike came back after being discharged from the Air Force.

Pam Pylant was an important influence in the MEMPHIS section of this web site. Once all the links and connections are in place I’m sure we’ll all find Six Degrees of Pam Pylant.

Rebecca’s story is, for me, one of the more interesting chapters of The Basement Diaries. But I don’t know it well enough to tell it. She was always very close to Joanne but never in the thick of things during the wild early years of late high school and college. If she every decides to tell the real story of her courtship with RP and the mysterious Workshop Hideaway, I’ll include it here. That she and RP have been married and happy for so many years probably says more about Becca than RP.

RP. No description of RP is going to do him justice but since most of the people visiting this site already know RP, little description is necessary. RP is equal parts poet, performance artist, sculptor, philosopher, handy-man…Joanne’s twin.

Buddy Shively. Buddy always seemed more grown-up than everyone else. Confident, directed. Buddy helped me get my first job in high school (at Liberty Supermarket). While the rest of us were farting away our lives during the Basement years, Buddy was building a career.

Terry and Nancy. McVey came late to The Basement Diaries. I’m not sure about the year. But they were instantly in tune. It was as though they walked in on the last reel of a movie but didn’t need to know what had come before to enjoy the rest of the picture.

Steve Watson. Watso. Bedog. A man of many names and few words. Unless he and Buddy Peck would secretly sit in a room and jabber away at each other, using up all the words they never expended on the rest of us. I couldn’t think of what to say about Steve and feared I’d have to leave this space blank. Jane Marshall came through with the following: “Steve and my brother were very good friends in high school, so I was not allowed to speak to him (as if Bedog would answer anyway). After Steve went off to school at Rolla I received a letter from him asking me out. He later phoned and we ended up going to the Delta Fair. Our conversation mainly consisted of “What do you want to ride?” “I don’t care, whatever you want to.” It ended at 10pm. So you can imagine my amazement when some years later we all pile in a car to go to the North End and Steve begins to sing (and knows all the words, too) “Haunted House”, “I’m a Honky Tonk Man”, and of course the hit we all remember, “Highway Robbery” by Terry Ray Bradley.”