Tonight's tribute is based on a blurry old photo and some scribbled names. The Lancemen were students from Arlington & Lawrence Central High Schools. In 1966 the Greenwood Mall was new and quite different than today. And they seemed to host teen band contests frequently, so that means lots of opportunities for more bands to be known!Members pictured:
Tom Burns - drums
Mike Keithley - guitar
Cheryl Cunningham - vocals
Bill Knipe - guitar
John Gardner - bass
I don't know of any Lancemen
45's out there, but I'm forever on the lookout!
As always, we would love to hear from you guys and gals. Anyone with any info, please feel free to share, you all have been so kind to help keep this going!
John Gardner found us!
"I was quite surprised to hear from my daughter that your blog existed and dumbfounded to find you remembered my band, the Lancemen. The picture you have is the first publicity photo we had made just after we started playing together. The girl is indeed Cheryl Cunningham. She was 5 or six years older than the rest of us. In fact when I was in grade school she lived next door and babysat me and my sister after school. She was only with the band for about 6 mos; got engaged and then married. I vaguely remember the band contest at the mall, but don't remember how we did. I know later in '66 we competed in the "Battle of the Bands" at the state fair and came in third. That prompted a picture and article in the Indpls News to be published, of which I still have a copy. It makes reference to the Greenwood Mall contest and our fourth place finish in another one at the old Carnegie Music store in Indy. We stayed together until the fall of '68 when I went off to college in Georgia. It was a fun way to go through HS and I have a lot of fun memories of playing school dances and parties. Probably the biggest gig we did was opening for the Indpls Kingsmen in a big sorority dance held at agriculture building at the state fairgrounds. I think we got $500. The worst was playing a dance in a tiny roller rink near Westfield for $50 and half the gate. I think only 20 or so people showed up. At 59 years old I am amazed at the power of the internet being able to bring the Lancemen back from the dead. Thanks for remembering and good luck."
Wonderful contribution! Thanks John and daughter. We remember and we honor you!
3 comments:
John Gardner is my dad. We were just talking about the band last night and looking at an old newspaper clipping from 1966. Today I was thinking about it and thought I would google the band to see if anything was out there about them and I found your blog. I will be sure to let him know about it too!
I was quite surprised to hear from my daughter that your blog existed and dumbfounded to find you remembered my band, the Lancemen. The picture you have is the first publicity foto we had made just after we started playing together. The girl is indeed Cheryl Cunningham. She was 5 or six years older than the rest of us. In fact when I was in grade school she lived next door and babysat me and my sister after school. She was only with the band for about 6 mos; got engaged and then married. I vaguely remember the band contest at the mall, but don't remember how we did. I know later in '66 we competed in the "Battle of the Bands" at the state fair and came in third. That prompted a picture and article in the Indpls News to be published, of which I still have a copy. It makes reference to the Greenwood Mall contest and our fourth place finish in another one at the old Carnegie Music store in Indy. We stayed together until the fall of '68 when I went off to college in Georgia. It was a fun way to go through HS and I have a lot of fun memories of playing school dances and parties. Probably the biggest gig we did was opening for the Indpls Kingsmen in a big sorority dance held at agriculture building at the state fairgrounds. I think we got $500. The worst was playing a dance in a tiny roller rink near Westfield for $50 and half the gate. I think only 20 or so people showed up. At 59 years old I am amazed at the power of the internet being able to bring the Lancemen back from the dead. Thanks for remembering and good luck.
John Gardner
bassist
Lawrence Central HS class of '68
Hello Lancemen,
We were and still are "The Lancemen" from Spooner, Wisconsin. We formed in 1963 and played in about a 100 mile radius of our home town. There were 5 of us also and we still get together about once a year yet! Most bands of that era had -men or -elles as part of their band names. Hope you had as much fun with it as we did and still do! Rock On!
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