The Landry families were new kids at the school and they were way ahead of us locals with pop fashion and insight. Mary and younger sister Vicky were instantly popular in our little town and they along with elder brother Scott and brothers Terry, Russ and Bobby fit in more easily than most kids from “away”. It helped that their parents had original roots in Dexter and they lived in a very familiar majestic old local house that we knew as “The Mayberry House”. The stone walled house that I always viewed as a mansion sat majestically across from Bailey Motors on Spring Street.

The Landrys were all pretty much down to earth folks and while the class struggles that abound in every small town may have been evident among our parents, most of us kids hung together and ignored the social stratification that small town status may have otherwise demanded.

One of our shared bonds was a devotion to each other as classmates and cultural peers. Many of us were Catholic and attended saint Anne's together in Catechism on top of the hill on Free Street. It is easy to walk those streets again in my mind. All of the blue collar working class families lived it seems to me in a much simpler kind of life then.

I really loved the Grammar School years; they were as Dickens penned “the best of times…..”

We drifted from one group of peers to the other often breeching the class strata I mentioned earlier. The Landry's really brought the whole unification through music thing to us. I am admittedly biased. But sixties music is and always will be some of the best in my lifetime. I hope to flesh this introduction to the Grammar School years out later.

More to come.
Fred