Keep your foot hard on the pedal
Son, never mind them brakes
Let it all hang out cause we’ve got a run to make

The boys are thirsty in Atlanta
And there’s beer in Texarcana
And we’ll bring it back no matter what it takes

All of our bikes have names, there’s no consistency to how they get them, we just bounce stuff off each other until something sticks. My Surly Long Haul Trucker is Cledus, named for Cledus Snow, the legendary long haul trucker from Smokey and the Bandit, played by The Guitar Man, Jerry Reed.

I was 7 years old in 1977, and saw two movies that changed my life. The first was Star Wars, viewed on the big screen of the Fox Theater in Carbondale, Illinois. The second was Smokey and the Bandit. The young and dashing Burt Reynolds as The Bandit, pert and sassy Sally Field as Carrie the fugitive bride, Jerry Reed as Cledus Snow, and Fred the basset hound, running across the highways of America from Jackie Gleason in a Kenworth and a Pontiac Trans-Am, yakkin’ on CB’s the whole time.

I saw each of those movies over a dozen times in the theater, which made for a weird summer. Ultimately, it’s the lightsaber that’s become an enduring element of our pop culture, but in 1977 trucking ruled the American imagination. In the years that followed, the Top 100 Hits always seemed to have a trucking song or two in it, movies and television shows about truckers and highway patrols were hits, every pickup and station wagon in the midwest had a CB antennae on it, and CB nomenclature seeped into everyday language. If you know what the phrase “10-4″ means, it’s probably because of Smokey and the Bandit, and I don’t think the Dukes of Hazzard would’ve come about without it.

Good times. I ate it all up, just loved it. It seems like an America that’s very far away now.

Jerry Reed passed away at the age of 71. Vaya con dios, Jerry, and take care.

[Update]: Wabash Cannonball, and Guitar Man (in technicolor!). It’s just so goddam good…

More? Okay. Bonus, you get to see Chet Atkins doing what them kids today call “shredding”.

[Update Again]: Clearly, what you wanna see if Jerry goin’ wild on that guitar. Here ya go.

Tags: Farewells

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