Musicians’ best friends to be honored in Freehold

PHOTO COURTESY OF MARION VINYARD Bruce Springsteen and his sister, Ginny, pose with their friends Tex and Marion Vinyard of Freehold. In May, officials will name a Center Street playground in the Vinyards’ honor.

Tex & Marion Vinyard

lent support, and floor

space, to local youths

By clare marie celano

Staff Writer

Tex Vinyard walked next door to complain about the volume of the music being played by a group of neighborhood kids. With that action, Vinyard started a chain of events that would ultimately lead to the birth of an American rock star.

According to Freehold Borough Councilman Kevin Coyne, borough officials are planning to honor Marion and the late Gordon "Tex" Vinyard by dedicating the small park at Center and Jackson streets across from the Rug Mill Towers in honor of the couple to acknowledge what they gave of themselves.

What they gave in turn would eventually give the borough of Freehold, and ultimately the world of music, a legacy that will live forever.

Ceremonies naming the park in honor of the Vinyards are scheduled for May 18.

Vinyard worked for Kimberly Clark in Spotswood during the day, but when his shift was over, much of his time was spent listening to the music of a neighborhood band called the Castiles.

According to George Theiss of Freehold Township, the initiator of the Castiles, Marion and Tex became surrogate parents to a group of kids who wanted to make it to the "Big Time."

One of those kids did make it to the "Big Time" — borough native and Castiles member Bruce Springsteen.

Theiss told Greater Media Newspapers his band was practicing one day in the mid-1960s at the Center Street home of Bart Haynes, drummer for the Castiles. (Haynes was later killed in Vietnam. In fact, he was the first soldier from the borough to die in Vietnam). Haynes lived in the duplex next door to the Vinyards.

According to Theiss, when Vinyard asked the kids to turn down the volume, it was Theiss who suggested that he might want to help them out by managing the band himself.

Vinyard did just that and the events that followed are now a part of rock ’n’ roll history.

Theiss said that a short while after the initial encounter with Tex, the members of the Castiles found themselves in the Vinyards’ home. The couple had turned their dining room at 35 Center St. into a makeshift studio to provide space for the band to practice, work on music, hang out and eventually, a place for every other kid in town.

Theiss recalled that although initially the Castiles were the only band that played in the Vinyards’ dining room, over a period to time, the number of kids grew.

"Kids in other bands would come around and listen to us. Then there were the sisters and the girlfriends and lots of other kid besides our own gang that would come and listen to us play. In fact, eventually, there were kids sticking out of the windows, out on the porch — they were everywhere," he said laughing.

Theiss recalled with a chuckle that borough Mayor Michael Wilson was among the youths hanging out on the porch and parking there to listen to the music.

"Marion and Tex were like second parents to us. They didn’t have any children of their own, and I think they kind of felt that we had become almost like their own children," Theiss said.

According to Theiss, who still plays guitar with the George Theiss Band, the Vinyards’ house was filled with kids most of the time. He said Marion cooked for them and made them feel at home while they practiced.

There was not a tremendous age difference between the band members and the Vinyards so they were better able to relate to one another than they would have had the couple been older.

"We could say and do things with Tex and Marion that we couldn’t do with our parents," Theiss said. "Yet, they were still very protective of us and supervised us.

"Tex would get us bookings and then shuffle us all over to the gigs in that ’61 black Mercury of his. Because the car always had these giant speakers hanging out of them, we inevitably got pulled over. In fact," Theiss remembers, laughing, "Once I opened my mouth, it was all over. My smart mouth got Tex a lot of tickets."

Theiss said he has many pleasant memories of those years between 1965 and 1967 with Marion and Tex guiding them. He remembers the generosity of the couple and things like Tex buying the band guitar strings and other equipment.

"I think it’s a wonderful idea for Freehold Borough to dedicate a park to the Vinyards," he said.

The new children’s playground and park at Center and Jackson streets is built on the site where the house that once nurtured, fostered and supported young talent and honored the dreams of a bunch of hometown kids who were reaching for the stars once sat. The Vinyards’ home was eventually torn down in the early 1970s.

According to Marion Vinyard, Tex passed away in December 1988. She remembers the Castiles and the music in those early days with fondness and a touch of nostalgic sadness for what no longer exists in her life.

When asked to go back to the beginning, Marion said that all she knew was that her dining room was gone for good. Memories flooded over the face of the woman who said she knew in her heart that Springsteen would make it.

"He always said he was going to make it," Marion said. "I believed him."

Among an array of snapshots and news clippings, Marion took a brief trip back in time and took a Greater Media Newspapers reporter along for the ride.

"I enjoyed all of it," she said, as she lightly fingered the snapshots that told the story of a rise to stardom for one young man and a heck of a ride for those who supported him.

She remembers when the "boys," as she endearingly referred to the members of the band, would practice while their sisters and girlfriends prepared food for them.

"We gave them a lot of tuna fish," Marion said, laughing. "The girls would also make pizza and hot dogs and sometimes biscuits, too."

Soon many other kids started arriving to watch the show.

From Marion’s description, the small duplex swelled with both the music of the boys’ playing and the audience would be tapping their own brand of rhythm to the sounds they heard.

She said she doesn’t remember anyone complaining about the volume of the music.

Wilson was one of those youths tapping to the music at the Vinyards’ home. According to the mayor, he was the lead singer in a band called Legend. Wilson called the Vinyards’ house the band’s "home away from home."

"I met Tex for the first time when my band was playing at the YMCA on a Friday night, just like in Bruce’s song," Wilson said.

"Bruce and Tex came to hear us. I was playing bass guitar and singing at the same time. Well," Wilson said, beginning to laugh, "I was kind of playing guitar and singing at the same time. Bruce and Tex noticed that my guitar wasn’t plugged in. My own band members didn’t see it, but they did. I got caught. I found out I couldn’t play guitar and sing at the same time. We laughed so hard. It was the end of my bass guitar playing career. I think I decided then that my career would be in politics and not in music."

Marion Vinyard said she enjoyed the kids in all of the bands Tex eventually ended up managing.

"We built a whole family over the years," she said.

One is witness to this family of teens of all shapes and sizes due to Marion’s self-appointed role as chief journal and record keeper of the family musical journey the whole group was traveling on.

"People used to tell me I was wasting my time," she said smiling, "but I didn’t think so."

Flipping through the pages of a photo album filled with Polaroids of teens sitting, standing, posing or eating snacks is actually like flipping through the history of the early years of rock ’n’ roll and the Vinyards’ absolute devotion to the kids who were making it all happen.

To this day, Marion continues to make collages for Springsteen — photos of his successes, year after year. She said Springsteen has the photos and memorabilia of the band’s history and his career for safe keeping.

Springsteen thanked the couple during his November 1996 concert at St. Rose of Lima School, South Street.

In dedicating "This Hard Land" to Marion Vinyard, Springsteen said of the couple, "They let us play loud. When Tex would come home, he’d somehow have an extra microphone that we needed. I can’t say how valuable that support was. Marion, I love you very much."

Marion said she always wanted a "dozen boys." She feels she and Tex had them. Although Tex and Marion shared — and she continues to share — a special closeness with Springsteen and Theiss, she said she still hears from many of the youths who were a part of her life in the those days.

When asked how she and Tex felt as they watched Springsteen’s rise to fame in the 1970s and 1980s, she said she always knew he would make it.

"Tex was tickled pink," she said. "We were both so very proud of him. His success made us both very happy."