Through the lens of the Juke Box: April 19-May 1, 1981

The Juke Box arrived on April 3rd and that evening, as well as the following Sunday and both nights of Easter weekend a fortnight later, the take was in excess of $10.00 meaning the juke box was making noise in excess of six hours. There are many bars that don’t take in $10 ($22 in 2008 dollars) per day from their juke boxes.

On April 4, 10, 11 and 24th the juke box grossed less than $10 … this accounting provides a glimpse of life at 340 at least for the month of April 1981 … 42% of these seminal weekend nights were totally off the hook and 58% were something less than that … make no mistake, however, even when quiet the 340 was crazier than your normal frat house … keep in mind Randy lived there … to this day the Randallion Cat remains both a babe magnet and happening waiting to happen

This brings us to Saturday, April 25th, 1981 … in order to commemorate the act that all good Amerikans were expected to perform at 2 am … we threw a party … Daylight Savings Time Party! Chi-Ching, Chi-Ching! The juke box gross of $12.10 which had stood for three weeks and a day was shattered before the clocks sprung forward … when I awoke the next morning (afternoon?) I found $15.80 in the juke box; 30% higher than the previous record.

One week later there was another excuse for a party. In order to demonstrate solidarity, we threw a May Day bash – Chi-Ching, Chi-Ching … a new record with $16.30 (or 9 hours, 47 minutes) in the bowels of the juke. Assuming a party ended at 4:00 a.m., not a bad assumption, it would have had to begin at 6:13 p.m. if the music was continuous! Earlier if the music – more likely – was not continuous. In other words these were “mothers of all parties” and we had them twice every weekend.