Page 95 - Been There… Done That!

Been There... Done That!
Van told us to meet him in the lobby at 10:00 am. We showed up at 10:00 am and waited until someone said to us that if we were waiting on Mr. Barker, he had left for the airport at 7:30 am. Talk about a sinking spell, he left country with our money and between us, all we had was about fifty dollars. It was time for me to go to work, so I went to TWA Airlines and offered a deal that for playing a show we would get passage for ourselves and our luggage to Honolulu and they agreed.
Once back in Hawaii I went straight to the Imperial Hotel on Waikiki where we had done some shows. In the lobby, I ran into Dorsey Burnette (rock and roll legend) and explained what had happened. He said Van was there, staying on the tenth floor. Dorsey told me that he would go with me to get the money, but I had to promise not to do anything foolish. As we started toward the elevator, the door opened and I saw Van laughing about something with some other guy and I couldn’t help myself but hit him and I didn’t care if he was 6’5” tall. Dorsey was yelling, “You promised,” and I yelled back, “Dammit, I lied but this S.O.B. is a thief.” It really did, in a strange way, feel good to watch him get up off the floor and tell me his wife would bring the money to me.
I had first met Dorsey in Hawaii in 1969, at the Imperial Hotel in Waikiki. I had always been a fan of Dorsey and his brother Johnny Burnette. They wrote the majority of Ricky Nelson’s hits and hits of their own, such as “You’re Sixteen,” “Hey Little One,” and many more. When I arrived at the Imperial, I asked the desk clerk if Dorsey had checked in and she believed he was in his room. When I went there, I found him with the door open, passed out crossways on
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