Willie Nelson has been a very influential person both in music and in other parts of life. He was certainly influential for the Bunkhouse Boys.

Craig and I saw Willie Nelson perform a few times and of course had some of his records. But another way he influenced us was the way he partied. Willie started a tradition of having a huge concert on the 4th of July. He called it his ” Picnic. “

Not long after the Bunk House boys got together in 1975 we decided we wanted to do a big full-day blowout. Craig had purchased the local tavern, and so had an “in” with the Coors beer distributor. They allowed us to use a refrigerated truck that held about 10 kegs of beer and had spigots on the outside of the body so you could pour all you wanted. It stored another dozen or so kegs inside the refrigerated section.

We also had volunteers to do the barbecue. I don’t recall exactly how much we charged, but I believe we started out having our own big party on the 4th of July with all the beer you can drink and free barbecue for the low price of $10. Each year was bigger and better.

For music, of course, we decided that the Bunk House boys would be headliners. However we would have other musicians come and play and sometimes jam with various members of our group. We also invited some of the bands and neighborhood towns to come and play.

Mike Miller, a former Norton classmate of Craig’s and owner of West End Recording Studio in the Kansas City area, came down and set up an awesome sound system for us. The stage was a flatbed trailer.

John Hix, another Norton classmate and a talented musician who could play any stringed instrument, would also join the fun.

Those two (Mike played bass) performed rock and new wave music with Ron Bailey on drums and our brother Bart on guitar. We had quite a variety of music going on.

I don’t think any tapes of those concerts survived. I do remember that one time I had one of those large old-fashioned reel to reel tape recorders, and set it up and got quite a bit of a Fourth of July concert on tape.

When you remember what year of this, you’ll understand why I might have made copies off of the master tape onto 8 track tapes. Those things were notoriously fragile, and I doubt if any of them have survived. I believe I also may have made copies on cassette tapes, but those are notoriously low fidelity.

Although I’d love to have a copy of any of those tapes if anyone has any kind of recording from the Bunkhouse Boys, I wouldn’t bet that you would get rich on them because I doubt if they are collectors items.

The party usually started in the afternoon and lasted well into the night until either all the food was gone, the beer was gone, or all the people were gone.

Since we were basically our own bosses, sometimes discipline became a little bit lax. It was often hard to get all of the Bunkhouse Boys on the stage together to play, and sometimes the breaks between sets went on a little longer than expected.

The Bunkhouse Boys Fourth of July picnic was a success and was repeated several times over the next few years. But we did it for the fun mainly — oh, and the food, and the beer, and whatever else would happen during those wild parties.

The wildest one was probably one hosted by Willie and Carol Warren, at their spread out in the country.

They moved to the Hoisington area from the Kansas City area, and Willie had some friends who were bikers that he invited down for one of our parties. And what a wild party it turned out to be!

During the day when the sun was hot, someone got the hose out and soon after — the clothes came off. Pretty soon we had mud wrestling, starting out with a bunch of hairy guys wrestling around in the mud. However I don’t think it took long for some of the ladies to join in.

We also ended up at least one time having a wet t-shirt contest. And I feel safe in saying that since we know that there are photographs surviving from that, some of the participants may hope that those photographs are permanently buried.

These parties were the true Spirit of the Bunkhouse Boys– and that spirit was embodied in Craig — Wild, uninhibited, undisciplined, and a heck of a lot of fun for everybody.

In all the years that we did this, I do not recall a single fight breaking out. Yes there was a lot of drinking going on, and a lot of wild activities, but it was all a big Love fest.

I don’t think that I could handle one of those parties these days. For one thing, I don’t drink anymore. Back then I used to start early and keep a steady pace until late at night. Also I’m more of an early-to-bed person than I was in those days. I was usually one of the last men standing at a party like that.

But if any anybody asks me to describe my brother Craig, I would say the Bunkhouse Boys Fourth of July parties were basically a manifestation of Craig’s personality.

I believe there are quite a few survivors of those parties still around today. Maybe they will send in their reminiscence of those late 1970s parties.

But then again there may be a lot of them who will just take the fifth amendment.