SHEP BEGINNING AT THE BEGINNING
Photo: Fred W. Mcdarrah November 30, 1966
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4.0 out of 5 stars Worth getting
Reviewed in the United States on January 23, 2023
Verified Purchase (Amazon)
If you’re a Shep fan you’ll love the pieces from his shows.
The author goes a little overboard with his opinions,
but it’s a minor problem. Very informative.
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The NYTimes book section of Sunday June 25, 2023
contains a difficult-to-believe closing statement in the interview
of author Len Deighton! Is he for-real, or is it a misguided sense of humor?:
Whichever, the comment is a bad influence on the world off literature.
For conservative readers who prefer the perfectly horizontal,
the obvious solution for you is to grasp your computer screen in both fists. Now tilt.
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You will see (or be reminded) gentle reader, in case you overlooked or forgot,
my page 10 of Excelsior, You Fathead’s! INTRODUCTION (SEE BELOW).
I trust that you will understand why the book is NOT a biography, but a description and appreciation of Shep’s genius—and thus why front matter of the book is crucial–ebb
The openings of my EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! are meant to explain that the book (despite the publisher’s unwanted and inaccurate flyleaf comment) that it’s a “biography.” Rather it is a very personal approach to what and why Jean Shepherd is of such importance to each listener’s thought processes that assist us in our way of seeing and responding to our world. That is the essence of why the book was written this way. Jean Shepherd would expect no less.
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There are, to my dismay, some readers who do not read a book’s preface and introduction! They must think those openings of a book are but wasted paper, ink, and the author’s ruminations regarding the essence of the book as-a-whole. (pardon me for comparing them to a touch of foreplay!)
The openings of my EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! Are meant to explain that the book (despite the publisher’s unwanted and inaccurate flyleaf comment) is not a “biography.” The openings are a precursor of contents and interpretation to come. They are a very personal approach to what and why Jean Shepherd is of such importance to each listener’s thought processes that assist us in our way of seeing and responding to our world. That is the essence of why the book was written, and, indeed, was written the way I did.
Jean Shepherd signing my copy of I, LIBERTINE. The event started with a Shep “mill.” Shep on occasion would suggest that listeners gather at some location, say nothing, do nothing but silently mill–then quietly disband, leaving others puzzled at what may have just happened.
After a “mill” at Manhattan’s 8th street Marboro’s book store (when we were gently asked to leave as we were preventing potential sales), we reconvened on the balcony of the 14th-Street Horn and Hardart’s where Shep signed my book. (Photo by Eugene B. Bergmann, April. 1957.)
SHEPHERD SERENDIPITOUS REDUX—LESSER EQUIVALENCE!
EBAY ONE
In my voluminous tome that describes and comments on our hero (EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! THE ART AND ENIGMA OF JEAN SHEPHERD) under the category of words, we encounter a discussion of Shepherd’s “Excelsior.” I quote from pages 216-217.
Shepherd says, You know what “Excelsior” means, don’t you? We will not go any further. “Excelsior” has a really deep hidden meaning in our lives, and certainly in my life. Etcetera, etcetera.
And of course, what is the countersign? When you hear that password belted out at you, you just look the guy right in the eye and say, “seltzer bottle, you slob.” “As you clammer up the icy slopes, reaching forever, reaching, grasping eternally, forever at that shifting cloud of reason….”
My comment on “seltzer bottle,” (Giving all one knew of at the time of the book’s publication in 2005): As for the “seltzer bottle” response one gave for “Excelsior”? It conveniently has the same ”sel” sound as “Excelsior,” linking the pompous word to the common, unflavored soda at the candy store, a two-cents plain –and the self-deluding, pomposity of “Excelsior” should deservedly elicit a slapstick clown’s squirt of it in the face!”
One should remember the Shepherd film, A CHRISTMAS STORY, the tale set in 1940. The old man’s major award is a leg lamp safely packed in excelsior wood shavings, which, to reveal his leg lamp, he strews the shavings (excelsior) all over the living room. The leg lamp safely arrived unscathed, but became no match for the mother “watering her plants.”
Nowadays, the protective excelsior would be bubble wrap. Which would cause a nasty problem for my book’s name. I’ve worked hard at a few alternate titles for EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD!, and although none falls so engaging from my quivering lips, I’ve settled on BUBBLE WRAP, YOU FATHEAD! THE ART AND PACKING MATERIAL OF JEAN SHEPHERD.
Yet, my comment when my book was published in 2005 -remains relevant—but, one day I thought I’d check “Excelsior” on ebay where I encountered scores of references besides the common wood-product packing material. I found a New Jersey company producing Excelsior-brand seltzer water!
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EBAY TWO
Onward and sort of upward!. Further ebay perusal led me to a British motor cycle company named “Excelsior.” They offered a small round pin for wearing on one’s jacket. See mine below, which I wear on many occasions. (Size outrageously enlarged for easy viewing.)
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EBAY THREE—
Any future ebay treasures the inquisitive reader needs to discover him/her self.
SHEPHERD SERENDIPITOUS!
For writing my EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! THE ART AND ENIGMA OF JEAN SHEPHERD, I used a number of techniques besides my previous knowledge of him and his works. Allison, my wife, with her superior mind and librarian skills has the advantage over me.) I used my previous knowledge of some investigative skills, and a certain tenacity. A major assist was a certain amount of serendipity.
DOUG MCINTYRE, is a serious Shep scholar.
Despite Lois Nettleton having told a reporter years ago that she would not talk about her relationship with Shepherd, to whom she’d been married for several years, from December 1960, and, Doug, whose wife knew Lois, told me that he had interviewed her on tape, and sent me an audio copy. I asked if he could send me Lois’ Hollywood address so I could send her a note and inscribed copy of my book. She replied with a delighted phone call and a hand-written letter (Oh, how I love you, serendipity!)
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JIM CLAVIN website (www.flicklives.com)
Jim’s website is an encyclopedic depository of all things Shepherd, and included a place for people to comment—which I frequently read. Leigh Brown’s best friend, Barbara, posted on it that she’d be interested in corresponding with someone about Shep. I immediately responded, and we had several exchanges—then she told me that she had numerous type-written letters from Leigh from the early days of her association with Shepherd—did I want them?! The letters included in detail Leigh’s plan to steal Shepherd from his wife, Lois. I discuss this in an earlier blog post.
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DEE SNIDER of Twisted Sister FEBRUARY 21, 2013
Years ago, with our son, Evan, at a bowling alley, another father asked me what I did after my retirement. I told him I’d just had published, the only book devoted to Jean Shepherd. He said he was a big Shepherd fan, and his brother, Dee was even a more enthusiastic fan!
I said I’d love to meet him and talk about Shep. Then one day a black Hummer pulled up in front of our house and out stepped a tall, slim man all in casual black—it was Dee Snider!
Dee and I spent three hours discussing the importance of Shepherd to his way of thinking and performing.
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WALLACE WOOD, Comic Artist & his Shep Connection
Wallace (Wally) Wood is considered by many to have been the greatest comic-book artist. A co-worker of mine told me that Wood would be at her apartment gathering one evening and asked if I’d like to come. There I met Wood, we talked, and he inscribed for me the “artist bio” from an issue of EC Comics. I have it as well as a Mad Magazine article, “The Night People vs. Creeping Meatballism,”about Shepherd’s enthusiasts, the illustrations by Wallace Wood–his name is in bottom right corner of illustration.
SERENDIPITY, Ya hit another outa da park!!!
Note: Although I’ve had serendipitous encounters throughout writing my EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! The instances above all occurred after the book was in print. (I have no hopes that the book might be updated in a new printing. More extensive discussion can be found in my http://www.shepquest.wordpress.com]
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5.0 out of 5 stars not a biography!
Reviewed in the United States on June 12, 2023
Author Eugene B. Bergmann here. Some customer reviewers on this page think erroneously –in part because the publisher insisted on calling it a biography–it is NOT! It is a description and appreciation of Jean Shepherd’s creative work, using a rough biographical framework. I sometimes in the book refer to Shepherd’s influence on me (as well as on so many others)–because Shep, was such a personal creative force for so many of us. I explain this in the opening pages of the book. EXCELSIOR!
SEINFELD, SHEPHERD, AND ME
To the editor, NY Times. Not Published:
Maya Salam, author of the 5/15/23 perceptive and insightful article about “Seinfeld,” (the show about nothing) goes deeply into the nature of the program. Jerry Seinfeld attributed his way of thinking to the New York-area radio improvising humorist/commentator, Jean Shepherd, who spoke to us nightly from 1956 to mid-1977. Perceptive adolescents such as Jerry Seinfeld, and many adults of the New York and surrounding areas were obsessed with Shepherd’s every word and insight. He combined introspection, imagination, and improvisation in jazz-extemporized riffs.
Seinfeld commented in his season 6 DVDs of his show, “[He] really formed my entire comedic sensibility. I learned how to do comedy from Jean Shepherd.” (Shepherd’s most familiar effort is the holiday film, “A Christmas Story,” which is based on his stories, and which he co-wrote and narrated.)
Shepherd, using much of his close observation to understanding “cracks in the sidewalk,’ which he called the seemingly inconsequential details in human activity, taught us that his perceptions often exposed more important, underlying connections. Seinfeld understands these connections.
In tribute to Shepherd, in 2005, Seinfeld spent an hour in a chock-filled auditorium at New York’s Paley Center for Media, explaining his fascination with Shepherd’s work. Also in 2005, Jerry Seinfeld named his new-born son Shepherd Seinfeld.
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Reasons for Letter
1. Importance of connections between Jerry Seinfeld and Jean Shepherd.
2. My ego trip.
.
Paley Center “Green Room”
He: “I love your book.” Me: “I love your TV show.”
SHEP SHRINE OVERVIEW
For decades we’ve had a Shep Shrine. The current one is in our one-car garage connected to our house, converted for some of my books, artworks, and an entire wall as the Shrine.
The large photo of the poster is by Village Voice photographer, Fred W. Mcnamara, who also photographed major figures in the arts/literature scene in the 1960s-1980s. The poster Shepherd advertised/sold through his radio program. I bought my used copy through ebay.
Just to right are several Excelsior Seltzer Bottles (I discovered in my varied searches, showing my discovery of how /why the response to “Excelsior, you fathead is “seltzer bottle.”) Below are my signed copy of INGOD WE TRUST—ALL OTHERS PAY CASH books about him as well as books by others that have parts of chapters about him, and related matters.
Also in cartons are files about Shep-related people and subjects, including Leigh Brown and Lois Nettleton. In addition to a signed copy pf Shepherd’s IN GOD WE TRUST ALL OTHERS PAY CASH, I have Lois’s long handwritten letter to me thanking me for writing my EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! And the couple of dozen hand-written notes with her comments about my Shep book. Th red valentine to the lower right is Lois’ hand made valentine she made for Shepherd. Below and to the right are my hand-written book manuscripts, including EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD!, SHEP’S ARMY, and the unpublished manuscript of my book with transcripts of many of Shepherd’s radio tales of his world-wide travels.
EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD!
EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! ADDITIONS
EYF! Was published in March, 2005. Subsequently, through research and happenstance, I’ve become aware of more info on Shep –see my blog references for the complete essays on each subject. I’ve posted them on Facebook (Eugene B. Bergmann) and my blog, shepquest.wordpress.com. Here are the references to a couple of these. Below I just indicate a bit of each. Should there be an updated version of my EYF! (though I highly doubt it). I indicate where this info might appropriately be inserted.
Importantly is the information I’ve gathered on Lois Nettleton and Leigh Brown, indicating their importance to Shep’s personal and professional life. For complete article, including visual material, see my blog for June 30, 2021.
Lois was the “listener” in Shep’s earliest New York days. She and Shep talked on the phone live on his program, met, dated, and married. She listened to his earliest overnight programs–she and Jean would discuss the shows afterward. She supported him professionally and personally.
Leigh began at WOR as an assistant and worked her way up to becoming his wife, helper, sometime-producer, and book agent for him. Many friends and associates indicated her importance to him—he could not live without her.
I’ve encountered many Shep enthusiasts subsequent to the book’s publication. Most interestingly and importantly is Dee Snider, leader/creator of the group “Twisted Sister.” Dee and I spent three hours in my “Shep Shrine,” discussing Shep’s influence on him. See my blog for February 21, 2013.
When exploring the ebay.com site for “excelsior,” I encountered the Shep reference to his reply to the greeting, “Excelsior, you fathead.” Without question in my mind, it is the Excelsior Soda Bottle Company! See my blog for September 20, 2022.
FOR A POSSIBLE BOOK ADDITIONS, INSERT AS NOTED BELOW:
Lois and Leigh page 293-300.
“Seltzer bottle” page 217.
Dee Snider (frontman/creator of group “Twisted Sister” (Best known for “We’re Not Gonna Take It”) at end of page 405 titled MORE ACCOLADES.
Excelsior, you fatheads!
BULLWINKLE’S EXCELSIOR, etc.
That infamous phrase—and the name of a book: EXCELSIOR, YOU FATHEAD! THE ART AND ENIGMA OF JEAN SHEPHERD.
See the book’s opening pages for the entire Wordsworth poem—I’d placed it in my chapter on WORDS, but the editor (without my knowledge) put it at the book’s very beginning—thus giving it prestige/prominence it does not deserve—didn’t he read my book manuscript closely enough to realize that Shepherd’s use of it is mostly a joke? Shepherd, for all his sensibilities wanted a certain amount of idealism (thus “Excelsior), yet he insisted on reality’s imperfections—thus, one who only expressed idealism and not the world’s imperfections, was a “fathead! (Note: Edward Lear and James Thurber both did parodies of Wordsworth’s “Excelsior.”)
For the book’s “excelsior” references, see chapter on words—Excelsior starting page 214.
Only after the book’s publication did I discover that the response to “Excelsior,” being “Seltzer bottle” (probably, with Shep’s secret amusement), referred, in part, to an actual seltzer company’s name! Naturally I now have several of said bottles. For one image, see my blog site, www.shepquest.wordpress.com April 8, 2019.
Viewers of Shepherd’s film, A CHRISTMAS STORY will note that the packing material for the notorious leg lamp, is, indeed, excelsior.
The wonderous ROCKY AND BULLWINKLE cartoon show (began 11/19/1959—several years after Shep began using the word “Excelsior,”). In the occasional cartoon segment titled “Bullwinkle’s Corner” I discovered the poem: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDYeav3nQEg), Bullwinkle acts out his silly, condensed version of the Longfellow poem. To which I say, “Excelsior, you fatheads!”
ARTSY–AIR DANCERS REDUX
Every time I encounter an air dancer my heart leaps. When driving on an errand, as we pass one by, it waves to me. Wishing I could dance like that, I wave back. My wife maybe thinks I’m silly (wacky?)—but I follow my delights wherever they lead me (within the law).
My earlier wacky air dancer essay is on my blog
(www.shepquest.wordpress.com). for July 12, 2016.
For those interested in inflated objects, see my ARTSY RATSY (9/18/19)
Now I have a mini wacky of my very own.
(Photo by Allison Morgan Bergmann)
I’VE NAMED HIM WACKY D.
ARTSY World of Bob Dylan
–On our bookshelves, I have over a dozen books I’ve read by and about Bob Dylan.–
What if you are a great enthusiast (as I am) of Michelangelo, Turner, Van Gogh, Cezanne, Picasso, and then you begin reading a compilation of learned essays founded upon the comprehensive archives in a university and you find that what you think you know is but an inkling?
(Cropped front cover.)
Such is my current experience in reading The World of Bob Dylan edited by Sean Latham, the director of Bob Dylan Studies at the University of Tulsa. (Dylan’s papers are now at the same location as those of Woody Guthrie.) The book consists of over two dozen essays by professors and other authorities on the life, influences, and essence of Dylan. Latham’s introduction begins:
Is there any writer or performer more haunting
—and more haunted—
than Bob Dylan?
Of the over 300 pages, I’ve just completed a part. And I’m overwhelmed. The first chapter, “The Biographies” by Andrew Muir begins:
Biographies can be curiously unfulfilling publications.
This is due partly to the ultimate unknowability of another person,
and partly to the motivations and circumstances
that bring these life-stories into being.
I’ve finished “The Blues” chapter by Greil Marcus–I hadn’t expected in it the depth and intensity I encountered:
In the blues, words first came from a common store of phrases,
couplets, curses, blessings, jokes, greetings and goodbyes
that passed anonymously….
As a modernist art, the blues is kin to
Cubism, Dada, Finnegans Wake (1939)….
Marcus describes the blues song, “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean,” and describes how Dylan renders it and why he does it this way:
As Dylan sings, his voice is scraped and braying,
frantic, enraged, immediate, noisy….
At the end of the blues chapter, Marcus describes Dylan singing “Lovesick”:
You can hear the song come into its own body:
the voice searching its way through the sound the song
has called up from the band, the words like weights
the singer has been forced to bear,
the guitarist’s notes fracturing as they twist into the air,
the pieces trying to find their way back to the chord they came from,
and never quite making it,
speaking that language of suspense.
I’ve read chapter 9, “Rock Music” by Ira Wells. At the bottom of the first page, Wells startles the reader (and will ultimately go on to explain):
The story of Dylan”plugging in” at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival
has seared its way into the American cultural imgaination:
it’s the Bob Dylan story known by those who
don’t know anything about Bob Dylan.
*
(Cropped back cover)
&
Amazon Customer Review
Allison5.0 out of 5 stars MARVELOUS BOOK! Reviewed in the United States on September 17, 2021 Verified Purchase This is the most interesting, informative, entertaining, and fascinating book I can ever remember reading. Don’t tell Hemingway, Mailer, and David Byrne that I said this.
(Allison Morgan Bergmann—the foregoing Customer Review is by my husband, Eugene B. Bergmann, for whom I bought this book—he is a published author who has been reading widely and constantly for well over 70 years. P. S. He is a Dylan enthusiast.)
&
ARTSY–DO IT!
In NYC’s East Village, I walked across the Square and entered St. Mark’s Bookshop. Right by the front cash register was a small table with two stacked up columns of paperbacks, Do It! by Jerry Rubin, a major revolutionary during the Hippy/Yippy movement. The listed publication date was March 15, 1970, so it must have been in that early Spring.
I picked the top book from one column—it was signed by Rubin with an innocuous inscription such as “Hello!” “Greetings,” or some such. I picked the top book from the other column and it was sighed “F…K!” and “Jerry.” But the complete four-letter-word was there in all its then-ignominious glory. I bought that copy and it’s been on a bookshelf in my study for about 50 years (snuggled up against Abbie Hoffman’s paperback, Revolution for the Hell of It!).
Below, my scan of that Do It! obscene word is obscured by me
so as not to offend,
and to avoid others from copying the scan.
But now, my censorship slip of paper removed,
it leaves, for me alone, the obscenity intact.
I must have read the book once, and it’s in perfect condition though the inside of the front cover and its facing inscription page are somewhat browned with age. Although there must be still in existence at least a couple of copies so-inscribed, I haven’t come across any.
Though I’ve always been rather timid/conservative (except in my quests for ARTSY FARTSY arts), for the last 50 years or so I’ve found myself to be politically center-left. Back then, however timid that I was, I’d been curious regarding the oddball bizarro goofy yippy world that captured headlines in the 1960s and 1970s–what are these people thinking and what are they doing? As I’d read the books, I must have had at least a bit of a clue.
But, for Jerry Rubin, the story ended rather sadly–and ironically. I still have a copy of the Times obituary–see below. Some years after his hairy revolutionary youth he rather transmorgrified–he’d shaved, cut his hair, joined Wall Street, and wore a suit. (He’s quoted as having said it was better to try to “change the system from within.”) He died at age 56–
when, one day in late 1994,
breaking a minor traffic regulation,
the former revolutionary and law-defyer
was fatally struck by a car—
while jaywalking.
I kid you not.
!
shepquest 
