I’m looking for stories of old Nantucket in the 60’s and 70’s, especially involving characters who are alive today, Opera House and Roadhouse stories, and anything involving Felix Pappalardi who had a house on the Polpis Road until his untimely death. Please send your best stories to me at emikeman@nantucket.net. This one comes from Jack Hobson.
In 1969, when I was a young buck with a rock band, I took my electric guitar to a tiny storefront in Manhattan to get some work done on it. I came back a week later to pick it up, and while we were waiting for a techie in the back room to finish an adjustment, I asked to see the custom Gibson Les Paul guitar hanging on the wall behind the counter. It was a magnificent guitar, with a custom scrolled headstock, taken from a mandolin of all things. Inlaid in abalone on the fretboard was the name, “Eric Clapton” in large, cursive letters. I asked how much it cost, and the sales clerk behind the counter said, “Two thousand dollars. You interested?”
I had blanched at the price, though that would be cheap in today’s dollars for such an instrument. I replied, “Nah. I mean, it’s a nice enough guitar but I wouldn’t want the thing.”
There was another customer in the store - it could only accommodate the two of us - and he asked me, “Why the hell not?!”
“It’s got Eric Clapton’s name on the fretboard.”
“So???”
“I wouldn’t want an axe with some other guitar player’s name in big letters on it. That’d be like having a chick with some other cat’s name tattooed on her chest.”
For some reason, this seemed to anger the guy. He brushed up to the counter, pulled out his wallet, and took out a thousand dollars and plunked it down. “I’ll buy it, then. I’ll be back later in the week with the rest of the money,” he said, then stormed out, slamming the door behind him.
“What the hell was that all about?” I asked the clerk.
He said, “Don’t you know who that was? That was Felix Pappalardi!”
That hardly explained the incident, but I just left it at that, paid for my guitar repair, and split.
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