There was a small sliver of time between Be-Bop and Hip-Hop, when a new generation of teenagers created rock 'n' roll. Clay Cole was one of those teenagers he was the host of his own Saturday night, pop music television show. Clay Cole's SH-BOOM! is the pop culture chronicle of that exciting time, 1953-1968, when teenagers created their own music, from swing bands and pop to rhythm and blues, cover records, a cappella, rockabilly, folk-rock, and girl groups; from the British Invasion to the creation of the American Boy Band. He was first to introduce Chubby Checker performing the ""Twist;"" the first to present the Rolling Stones, Tony Orlando, Dionne Warwick, Neil Diamond, Bobby Vinton, the Rascals, Ronettes, Four Seasons, Dion, and dozens more; the first to introduce music video clips, discotheque, go-go girls and young unknown standup comedians Richard Pryor, George Carlin, and Fannie Flagg to a teenage television audience. ""I was always jealous of that head of hair and tall, skinny body - otherwise, good memories of his television shows and the Brooklyn Paramount."" -- Neil Sedaka ""American pop singer, pianist, and songwriter"" After his "fifteen years of fame," Clay reveals, for the very first time, his reason for walking away from his highly-popular Saturday night show at 30-years old, and remain out of the spotlight for over forty years. Clay has been called "the missing link to the Sixties." Well, he's missing no longer; he's back with a remarkable story to tell. And what a story it is! SH-BOOM!is brimming with the gossip, scandal and heartbreak of the upstart billion-dollar music-biz in this breezy, behind-the-scenes look at 'live' television, mom-and-pop record companies and a boozy, mafia-run Manhattan, during the explosion of rock 'n' roll music. After his "fifteen years of fame," Clay reveals, for the very first time, his reason for walking away from his highly-popular Saturday night show at 30-years old, and remain out of the spotlight for over forty years. Clay has been called "the missing link to the Sixties." Well, he's missing no longer; he's back with a remarkable story to tell. And what a story it is! SH-BOOM!is brimming with the gossip, scandal and heartbreak of the upstart billion-dollar music-biz in this breezy, behind-the-scenes look at 'live' television, mom-and-pop record companies and a boozy, mafia-run Manhattan, during the explosion of rock 'n' roll music. Clay Cole is one of live television's true pioneers, beginning in 1953 at age 15, as host and producer of his own Saturday night teenage music show. By the time he was 21, he was the wildly-popular singing-dancing star of New York's top-rated Clay Cole Show from 1959 to 1968. Clay has written and produced over 3500 broadcast television shows, winning two Emmy Awards, and induction into the NYPD Honor Legion, his proudest moment. After forty-four years as a New Yorker, Clay now lives on a remote island in North Carolina, where the Cape Fear River flows into the Atlantic, ""a quaint little drinking village with a fishing problem."" David Hinckley joined the New York Daily News in 1980 and has spent most of his years there writing about music, radio and television. He has also served as critic-at-large, from which perch he has tried to frame a context for modern American popular culture while often settling for a reference to Chuck Berry or the Brooklyn Dodgers. He lives in New Jersey with his wife and more recordings than he'll ever be able to listen to. Sh-Boom!: The Explosion of Rock 'N' Roll 1953 – 1968 By Clay Cole Morgan James Publishing Copyright © 2009 Clay Cole All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-60037-638-2 Contents Introduction by David Hinckley, Overture, 1) Youngstown, Ohio 1938 – 1954, 2) Chicago/Cumberland Gap – 1954, 3) Ohio to NYC, 1955 – 1957, 4) NBC to Channel 13, 1957 – 1959, 5) Channel 13, NYC – 1959, 6) Payola Scandal – 1959, 7) Copacabana, 8) Palisades Amusement Park – 1960, 9) Twist – 1961, 10) Apollo, 11) Brooklyn Paramount Theatre, 12) WPIX-TV, 13) Channel 11 – 1963, 14) Family Matters, 15) Girl Groups, 16) British Invasion, 17) Clay Cole's Happening Place, 18) Motown, 19) American Boy Bands, 20) The Party's Over, Coda, Here, There and Everywhere, Index, About the Author, CHAPTER 1 1) Youngstown, Ohio 1938 – 1954 "A coincidence is a small miracle, in which God chooses to remain anonymous." Some people are lucky enough to have been born at the exact moment in time. I was one of them, born on the cusp of rock 'n' roll and ten years before the postwar baby boom. I was a New Year's baby, born Albert Rucker, Jr. and delivered in the early morning hours of January 1, 1938. By an ironic twist of fate, it was a Saturday, a night destined to be my television time-slot in the coming two decades. "Thanks for the Memory" was the song of the year, winning the Oscar. When Bob Hope sang it in the picture "The Big Broadcast of 1938," a long-standing Hollyw