The Great Makeover of 1970

The Story

The exterior of The Garret went through several color schemes over its life. During my time there it was first black, then vaguely sand colored and finished as charcoal gray. This is the story of its last transformation.

One night Terrea was overheard to remark that she wasn't happy with the Garret's current color (sand) and couldn't remember why it had ever been painted that color in the first place. Coincidentally, this was about a month before her birthday and BJ's. All this was quietly discussed among some of the regulars and a plot was hatched to surprise them with a newly painted building.

Cheryl Thomas, a commercial artist, took charge of the project, chose the new color scheme and even devised a technique for turning the front windows into faux stained glass. A group of us were recruited to implement her plan. It remained only to get Terrea, BJ and the rest of the staff away from the place long enough to do the deed.

At that time, The Garret was dark Monday and Tuesday nights. After closing time on the Sunday of BJ and Terrea's birthday week the kitchen staff and friends promised to clean up and lock up and all but hustled them out the door and sent them home. As soon as their cars were out of sight, brooms, mops, gallons of paint and brushes appeared and the race was on.

We had until opening time on Wednesday to get the job done. For the next two and a half days we worked around the clock (in my case, taking a few hours off to attend college classes), cleaning, painting, eating and sleeping on the job site.

We were once interrupted by a neighbor who complained about the noise (it was 4:00 a.m. on the first day) and once visited by Health Department inspectors who left when I explained we weren't open to the public (fortunately before they noticed Cheryl's cat – the project mascot – on the premises).

Considerable improvisation was involved in some aspects of the work. We made up some tricks as we went along.

By Wednesday evening the work was done, we were all exhausted and it was decided to hide on the roof, wait for Terrea and BJ's arrival and hope they liked what we'd done.

Fortunately for us all, they did. A birthday party was quickly organized. Shortly after that I collapsed from lack of sleep and so know nothing more of events until the next day, when things got back to what passed for normal.

The logo picture at the top left of the Web site pages shows the final look with most of the work crew sitting in front. Unfortunately, we didn't know who owned the car in front, so couldn't get it moved out of the way.

While the work was in progress, I tried to document the event with photographs. Unfortunately, the only cameras I had available at the time were of poor quality – little better than toys. Nevertheless, I was able to put together an album of our crew at work, which I gave to Terrea and BJ as part of the package. When The Garret closed for the last time the album came back to me, minus a few photos and negatives that someone decided to keep. I recently found some of the original negatives in my archives, faded with the years, and had them reprinted for this Web site. Below is what some of us looked like, in June of 1970.

The Work Crew Liz Burkhart Tana Chamberlain Diana Gagnon Jerry Hollombe Donna Lafortune Joy Neff Toni Robinson Cathy Singleterry Cheryl Thomas Ania Veres Jan Vose

Liz, Diana, Ania, Cheryl, Joy, Cathy and Tana.

Photos of the Project in Work.