Pine Nuts: That Tahoe Summer of ‘61
Submitted by Jeff Munson on Sun, 10/06/2024 - 3:53pm
As of this writing, it appears the Tahoe Conservancy is about to acquire Motel Six, a happy ending for a motel that used to charge six dollars. I happened to have enjoyed a summer there myself some sixty-three summers ago. Yes, in that heavenly summer of ’61, Motel Six was the Sands, and they hired a 17-year-old lifeguard to work their pool for the summer, yours truly.
I’ll never forget my first morning on the job. I went early to clean the pool and saw something shiny on the bottom at the deep end. Upon closer observation I discovered six shiny silver dollars that some lucky winner had tossed into the pool on their way to their room. That was a harbinger of things to come.
I had a fake ID, (sorry Mom), and let myself into the Southshore Room at Harrah’s to see Sammy Davis JR. He was amazing, and on the way out I stopped in the lounge to see Louie Prima and Keely Smith, with Sam Butera on the saxophone — free!
I didn’t have to save any lives that summer, so life was good, though I did have one code brown to deal with. A grown woman discovered a floating piece of kaka in our pool, and after letting out a howl that could be heard in Elko, started yelling for me to do something about it, which of course, I did. That code brown was the only blemish in an otherwise perfect summer of ’61.
I stopped into the office of the Motel Six a few summers ago while I was working on the Tahoe Queen as Mark Twain, and asked the receptionist, “Do you recognize me?”
"No,” she said, “I’m sorry, but I don’t.”
“Well, I was a lifeguard here in the summer of ’61.” I crowed.
“Oh, I wasn’t born yet…and neither was my mother.”
That corked me up pretty tight. But here’s the fun part.
My girlfriend back there in that dreamlike summer of ’61, was Tina Cole, who would go on to star in the long running TV sitcom, “My Three Sons.” And guess who is driving down to Sacramento later this month to have dinner with her sixty-three summers later? What a lucky boy!
As a footnote, six decades after my slightly illegal entry into the South Shore Room, I would find myself in that same room. But this time, instead of a little fake ID, everything was fake, as I would be in a white suit, addressing a full house as The Ghost of Mark Twain. What a difference sixty-years can make.
So, when Motel Six passes into the capable hands of our Tahoe Conservancy, I shall make point to be there to lift a glass of champagne to that glorious summer of ’61, when a 17-year-old lifeguard saw six shiny silver dollars staring up at him from the bottom of the pool, and all was right with the world.
— For more than 35 years, in over 4,000 performances, columnist and Chautauquan McAvoy Layne has been dedicated to preserving the wit and wisdom of “The Wild Humorist of the Pacific Slope,” Mark Twain. As Layne puts it: “It’s like being a Monday through Friday preacher, whose sermon, though not reverently pious, is fervently American."
Want to hear McAvoy Layne tell it? Go here for an audio version of this column.
