From that point on, Buddy Bannerman began controlling popular culture in Columbia. If entertainers made it on his show, they'd be popular. If he pulled the plug on them, their dreams were pretty much over. Out of all the entertainers who made it big on his show, none were more popular than one music group: Johnny Cashew and the Rebs.
The history of the most influential pop culture phenomenon since The Riverboaters band in the Roaring 'Teens began in the back-alleys of St. Augustine, in the Florida region of the Georgia Republic. Half-Hispanic Jonathan Spencer was a broke 17 year-old orphan participating in petty crime and pickpocketing, when one day he found a busted guitar in a trashcan. He took it back to the tenement he lived in and began trying to fix it up in his spare time. Soon, he learned he had a knack for the instrument, and he started playing for five bucks a night in saloons, bars, and nightclubs in St. Augustine. People loved him. His style was totally new, with a heavy twanging guitar and "backwoods yellin'" style singing. He started being able to afford nicer clothes, and then a nicer guitar. He started wearing his hair like the Cubans did, something which was considered very odd and unusual, and made him the target of several "Greaser" jokes, a derogatory term for Hispanics. He embraced the name, and so did the subculture he was about to create.
Then, he joined up with four other musicians: guitarist Joe Gunderson, pianist Larry Russo, saxophonist Mikey Lewis, banjo-player Chuck Carry, and drummer Mac "Hillbilly" Hooter. The team was formed, and Spencer, Gunderson, Lewis, Carry, and Hooter were about to take the world by storm. The one obstacle in Spencer's mind, though, was that he hated his name. So, following a joke from Lewis about how much Spencer loved eating nuts, Jonathan Spencer became Johnny Cashew, "which had a nice, Southron, down-home sound." Johnny Cashew and the Rebs were born.
The popular culture establishment hated the band. They liked spats, fedoras, top hats, and striped suits, and most of all much less "rambunctious" music. Nevertheless, Buddy Bannerman booked them for Friday, September 15th, 1951. Despite the fact that Russo and Carry were not able to attend due to getting involved in a minor traffic accident, the appearance was a huge success. That night, the entertainment world changed forever.
Footage of the original Rebs appearance on the Buddy Bannerman Show, Friday, September 15th, 1951:
http://youtu.be/K8uZutr1avs?t=21s
The reaction from parents was immediate. Despite the fact that many of they themselves had been involved with the riverboater/honky tonk culture in their youth, they were trying to crush the new youth movement before it took off. But it was too late. "Cubabilly" music, as it was starting to be called, was there to stay. Half a year later, the first movie about Cubabilly street gangs in St. Augustine was out. "The Reckless Ones" was a smash hit motion picture starring Marlin Brander as a tough-as-nails ex-boxer, Johnny Valentine, trying to win the love of roadside waitress Patricia (played by Jeanette Vega) while keeping his position as head of the ultra-violent Skull Boys motorcycle gang. It was the number one movie in the South for two straight months.
Brander and Vega in a scene from The Reckless Ones (1952)
The next music hit for Cashew and the Rebs was "
Tequila," which incited so much anger from parents that they held public burnings of the album. The Rebs continued to sell records and top the talkie box charts in the South, though, and then it spread across the waters to Gran Colombia and north to Quebec.
But the group soon found competition. Sprouting up all over non-Union areas of North America were copy-cat acts, like the anti-Churchill English immigrants who formed
The Ferrymen in Quebec City. By late 1952, there were over 58 successful Cubabilly bands and solo artists, only one of which was from Cuba (Jose Vargas), and they were driving traditional honky tonk culture into extinction. Everywhere, young people were "going Cuban." Motorcycles became all the rage, and teen violence and gang participation sky-rocketed. Even the Negro population was getting into the subculture, and Georgia-born "Brother John" was the most popular, with hits like "I'm a Soul Man."
The new nightly PB news hours showed "wild teenage violence in the streets." "St. Augustine is on the verge of collapsing into anarchy!" lamented one broadcaster. "These wild greasing so-called Cubabillies are mowing each other in drive-by shootings. Motorcycle accidents on every corner. Illegal street racing! Reckless endangerment of our fair, law-abiding citizens! These hoodlums must be stopped!"
Photo of a female Cubabilly sporting a necklace with Johnny Cashew's portrait in St. Augustine, Georgia (1953)
Stock car races like this one in Newport News, Virginia Republic, were dominated by greaser racing teams in the 1950s.
At its height of popularity, racing was as popular as baseball itself.
As the South was trying to get its youth under control, the Republican Union didn't have any youth that needed controlling. They had carefully blocked out the subculture's influence and cracked down hard on youth gangs. The fashion didn't change; men still wore spats, top hats, parted their hair down the middle with bacon grease, and women still wore dresses down to their lower calves. The Union PB shows were entirely different from the Southern ones. Mild-mannered hosts showed "harmless" entertainment and comedy and singing acts, and every Sunday all the shows that came on were religious in nature. Every Saturday night at 6, starting in 1951, Joseph Steele himself would appear for the "All-American Saturday Night Family Hour." He would give "fireside chats" to rally the nation and address important issues from the comfort of his rocking chair beside his fireplace. He was always in uniform.
"Hello, my citizens! My fellow Americans, I have some important issues I'd like to discuss with you, if you have the time. I'd like to talk about work. You see, without hard work, a man just has, well, a dadgum empty place inside. We need to work harder, all of us! We need to be productive if we are going to fulfill our Manifest Destiny. Of course, there are those among us who seek to deter you from working. These snake-oil salesmen, these anarchists, promise better wages and better treatment... if you go on strike. *laughs* Well, I don't know about you, but if there's one thing I can't stand it's a striker. I hate those cretins. The recent events at the auto factory in Boston are absolutely unacceptable. The fifty assembly line employees who dropped their tools of Christian labor have proven themselves some sort of retarded tools to be used by anarchists and communists. Have no fear, they shall learn from their... mistakes... at our excellent reeducation facilities in the Ohio Country, where they shall be taught respect for authority, camaraderie, and a Christian work ethic by our wonderful, kind camp counselors. So, before we go to a commercial break, I'd like to tell you all to keep working hard! Work faster! Better! Stronger! Double your production! That's the American spirit! Stay healthy, so you can keep your country healthy with your manual labor. And remember, smoke Soaring Eagle Smokes! For a smoke that gives you a good taste, without irritating your throat! Recommended by 90% of doctors and dentists. Remember, ask for Soaring Eagle Smokes! God bless you, one and all! And God Bless America!"
The above was a typical introduction of a
Family Hour show. Steele would rant about whatever subject he wanted while still trying to come across as a lovable grandfather. Sometimes he would even be toasting smores as the camera focused in on him at the start of the show. There would be numerous guests that would appear after him, such as Joey Gobells, Second Chief Consul Roosevelt, generals, admirals, and Union celebrities like Max Cross, Richard Nixon, and Mary-Jane Mundy. The last ten minutes of the show were for CYB members only, and the CYB Headmaster-Marshal would show them a "Scouting Tip of the Week," such as how to start a fire, how to make a tent from branches, how to use a sundial, and how to sharpen a bayonet. It was a successful show, and almost every member of the Betters of Society tuned in... if they knew what was good for their health. It was the best thing to ever happen to the propaganda department in Philadelphia; at last, they could reach their citizens right in their houses every week for a solid brain-washing.