Brother Dave Gardner
Encyclopedia
David Gardner known as Brother Dave Gardner, was a U.S. comedian
and singer.
A Tennessee
native, Gardner studied drumming, beginning at age 13. After a one-semester term as a Southern Baptist ministerial student at Union University in his hometown of Jackson, Tennessee, he began a musical career as a drummer and occasional vocalist. After a pair of demo singles for Decca Records
around 1956, he had a 1958 Top-20 hit on OJ Records with White Silver Sands
.
It was his comedic routines between songs, however, that brought him to the attention of RCA
Records artist & producer Chet Atkins
. The eventual result was a comedy album interspersed with a couple of songs - Rejoice, Dear Hearts! (1959), which propelled Brother Dave into the national eye, along with the first of several appearances on national television talk/variety shows such as The Tonight Show
.
An arrest for marijuana possession in 1962 curtailed his visibility on television. Then, it seemed, changing public tastes (i.e., the falling out-of-favor of 'beatnik
'-style comedy), coupled with Gardner's holding onto his same performing style, resulted in a similar fading of his recording career. After six albums for RCA
Victor Records, he made two for Capitol Records
, and then others for lesser labels. He had another legal problem over tax-evasion charges in the 1970s, which his son helped clear up.
Brother Dave had a role as a Southern preacher in the 1978 made-for-TV film Big Bob Johnson's Fantastic Speed Circus. He was cast in a B-grade movie, and was just beginning work on it at the time of his death.
Gardner was twice married: his first wife, Millie, preceded him in death, and he was married to his second wife, Judy, at the time of his death. He had two children from his first marriage—son Dave II (deceased, 1999) and daughter Candace.
, Jean Shepherd
) with a classic Southern 'storyteller/liars'-bench' manner (e.g., Andy Griffith
, and the later Justin Wilson
and Jerry Clower
), setting himself apart a bit from Northern Jewish contemporaries such as Mort Sahl
, Lenny Bruce
, and Shelley Berman
. His "stream of consciousness" style got him in trouble in 1963 when he was booked by Baylor University student Rod Phelps to perform on campus. His line that went something like "I was in World War Two and I saw lots of blood spilled but it never sent anyone to Heaven" caused the audience to leave in droves. The Baylor President called Phelps into his office the next day and handed Rod a handful of telegrams complaining about Gardner's performance. Phelps had to write each sender and apologize for the remark. He had succeeded in getting Baylor to book Brother Dave because Gardner's uncle was a pastor who had developed the Sunday evening "Training Union" program then widely used in Southern Baptist churches.
Phelps went on to become an entertainment attorney and booked Brother Dave into a number of small town venues, including Temple, Texas, where the audience consisted of a number of President Lyndon Johnson's relatives. Gardner went off on then President Johnson and Phelps had to refund a number of patrons.
Phelps produced Brother Dave's last live concert on December 19, 1979, at Panther Hall in Fort Worth, Texas.
In the early 1980s Texas oilman H.L. Hunt moved Brother Dave and wife Millie to Dallas because of Gardner's proclivity to be a staunch conservative, and to not be afraid to "tell it like it was". Hunt soon became disenchanted with Gardner's alcohol and drug abuse and cut Brother Dave off.
Gardner mixed thought-provoking or confounding stand-alone one-liners, or 'zingers' (e.g., "An' I'm writin' a new book an' it's gonna be called "What Will the Preachers Do When the Devil is Saved?"", "Gratitude is riches, and complaint is poverty, and the worst I ever had was wonderful!", "Let them that don't want none, have memories of not gettin' any... let that not be their punishment, but their reward," and "Don'tcha know a diamond ain't nothin' but a piece o' coal that's stuck with it?") with satirical musings on his contemporary political scene ("...folks used to pray to God for rain, and now they call Washington,", "Say, a Democrat is somebody who expects somethin' fer nothin', and a Republican is somebody who expects nothin' fer somethin', an' a Independent is a cat that greases his own car," and "If I were bound by either party, well then, I might ferget America,"). He also told traditional, humorous Southern stories, the most notable among these being "The Motorcycle Story", "When John Gets Here" (also called "The Haunted House"), and his version of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar as set in Rome, Georgia
.
Brother Dave got a good deal of comic mileage from his boosting of all things Southern, making him a latter-day version of Kenny Delmar's "Senator Claghorn
" on Fred Allen
's classic radio show. He smoked cigarettes during his routines, describing them as "a Southern product," and declaring "I like cigarettes - I'd smoke chains if I could light 'em." He spoke of a Southerner's culinary fondness for "a Moon Pie
and an Ar-uh-Cee (R.C. Cola
)." Anticipating the bottled-water market by almost 30 years, he remarked that, at Hot Springs, Arkansas, he had seen "some o' them ignorant, stupid Southerners sellin' water to them brilliant Yankees." He noted that the difference between a Northern Baptist and a Southern Baptist was that a Northern Baptist said, "There ain't no Hell," and a Southern Baptist said, "The hell 'ere ain't."
While Gardner did spin routines based on a wide-ranging social freedom, some of his material did play off racial stereotypes of his time. Often, he had African-American characters in his routines speak with an exaggerated, high-pitched, Butterfly McQueen
-style accent, as in "The Motorcycle Story." In another of his routines, a black woman exclaimed, "James Lewis, git away from dat wheelbarrow -- say, you know you doesn't know nothin' 'bout machin'ry!"
However, some people not familiar with the idiomatic Southern term "ol' boy" objected to Brother Dave's usage of it, thinking that the person referred to was a black man. But this was not so. In his story entitled "Rejoice, Dear Hearts!" an "ol' boy" who "drove for the governor" ruined the car on the first day because he didn't understand what the letters on the automatic transmission stood for. ("Well, we was both goin' about 80 and he tried to pass me, so I dropped it into Race!") Among Southerners, "ol' boy" then and now refers to a generally harmless, well-meaning, not-too-smart-or-overly-well-educated young or middle-aged man—usually Caucasian. It's not to be confused with the demeaning "boy" that in years past was used by some Southern whites to refer to a black male. Although Gardner's early-1960s albums for RCA Victor contained questionable racial humor, there is nothing like the overtly racist content of his late-1960s act.
In addition, his first four albums have been reissued on the Laugh.com label, and his routines can occasionally be heard on Sirius XM satellite radio channels Blue Collar Radio(SiriusXM 97) and Laugh USA (SiriusXM 96).
Comedian
A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience, primarily by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing situations, or acting a fool, as in slapstick, or employing prop comedy...
and singer.
A Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
native, Gardner studied drumming, beginning at age 13. After a one-semester term as a Southern Baptist ministerial student at Union University in his hometown of Jackson, Tennessee, he began a musical career as a drummer and occasional vocalist. After a pair of demo singles for Decca Records
Decca Records
Decca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
around 1956, he had a 1958 Top-20 hit on OJ Records with White Silver Sands
White Silver Sands
"White Silver Sands" is a popular song. The words and music were written in 1957 by Charles 'Red' Matthews, although partial authorship is also claimed by Gladys Reinhart....
.
It was his comedic routines between songs, however, that brought him to the attention of RCA
RCA
RCA Corporation, founded as the Radio Corporation of America, was an American electronics company in existence from 1919 to 1986. The RCA trademark is currently owned by the French conglomerate Technicolor SA through RCA Trademark Management S.A., a company owned by Technicolor...
Records artist & producer Chet Atkins
Chet Atkins
Chester Burton Atkins , known as Chet Atkins, was an American guitarist and record producer who, along with Owen Bradley, created the smoother country music style known as the Nashville sound, which expanded country's appeal to adult pop music fans as well.Atkins's picking style, inspired by Merle...
. The eventual result was a comedy album interspersed with a couple of songs - Rejoice, Dear Hearts! (1959), which propelled Brother Dave into the national eye, along with the first of several appearances on national television talk/variety shows such as The Tonight Show
The Tonight Show
The Tonight Show is an American late-night talk show that has aired on NBC since 1954. It is the longest currently running regularly scheduled entertainment program in the United States, and the third longest-running show on NBC, after Meet the Press and Today.The Tonight Show has been hosted by...
.
An arrest for marijuana possession in 1962 curtailed his visibility on television. Then, it seemed, changing public tastes (i.e., the falling out-of-favor of 'beatnik
Beatnik
Beatnik was a media stereotype of the 1950s and early 1960s that displayed the more superficial aspects of the Beat Generation literary movement of the 1950s and violent film images, along with a cartoonish depiction of the real-life people and the spiritual quest in Jack Kerouac's autobiographical...
'-style comedy), coupled with Gardner's holding onto his same performing style, resulted in a similar fading of his recording career. After six albums for RCA
RCA
RCA Corporation, founded as the Radio Corporation of America, was an American electronics company in existence from 1919 to 1986. The RCA trademark is currently owned by the French conglomerate Technicolor SA through RCA Trademark Management S.A., a company owned by Technicolor...
Victor Records, he made two for Capitol Records
Capitol Records
Capitol Records is a major United States based record label, formerly located in Los Angeles, but operating in New York City as part of Capitol Music Group. Its former headquarters building, the Capitol Tower, is a major landmark near the corner of Hollywood and Vine...
, and then others for lesser labels. He had another legal problem over tax-evasion charges in the 1970s, which his son helped clear up.
Brother Dave had a role as a Southern preacher in the 1978 made-for-TV film Big Bob Johnson's Fantastic Speed Circus. He was cast in a B-grade movie, and was just beginning work on it at the time of his death.
Gardner was twice married: his first wife, Millie, preceded him in death, and he was married to his second wife, Judy, at the time of his death. He had two children from his first marriage—son Dave II (deceased, 1999) and daughter Candace.
Brother Dave's comedic style
During his brief time as a star among America's socially-aware stand-up comedians of the late 1950s and early 1960s, Brother Dave successfully fused a stream-of-consciousness style of addressing subjects (e.g., Lord BuckleyLord Buckley
Lord Richard Buckley was an American stage performer, recording artist, monologist, and hip poet/comic...
, Jean Shepherd
Jean Shepherd
Jean Parker Shepherd was an American raconteur, radio and TV personality, writer and actor who was often referred to by the nickname Shep....
) with a classic Southern 'storyteller/liars'-bench' manner (e.g., Andy Griffith
Andy Griffith
Andy Samuel Griffith is an American actor, director, producer, Grammy Award-winning Southern-gospel singer, and writer. He gained prominence in the starring role in director Elia Kazan's epic film A Face in the Crowd before he became better known for his television roles, playing the lead...
, and the later Justin Wilson
Justin Wilson (chef)
Justin E. Wilson was a southern American chef and humorist known for his brand of Cajun cuisine-inspired cooking and humor. He was a self-styled "raconteur" and a staunch political conservative....
and Jerry Clower
Jerry Clower
Howard Gerald "Jerry" Clower was a popular country comedian best known for his stories of the rural South. He was often nicknamed "The Mouth of the South", although this title has also been used for other individuals.Clower began a 2-year stint in the Navy immediately after graduating high school...
), setting himself apart a bit from Northern Jewish contemporaries such as Mort Sahl
Mort Sahl
Morton Lyon "Mort" Sahl is a Canadian-born American comedian and actor. He occasionally wrote jokes for speeches delivered by President John F. Kennedy. He was the first comedian to record a live album and the first to perform on college campuses...
, Lenny Bruce
Lenny Bruce
Leonard Alfred Schneider , better known by the stage name Lenny Bruce, was a Jewish-American comedian, social critic and satirist...
, and Shelley Berman
Shelley Berman
Sheldon "Shelley" Berman is an American comedian, actor, writer, teacher, lecturer, and poet.- Early life :Berman was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Irene and Nathan Berman.- Career :...
. His "stream of consciousness" style got him in trouble in 1963 when he was booked by Baylor University student Rod Phelps to perform on campus. His line that went something like "I was in World War Two and I saw lots of blood spilled but it never sent anyone to Heaven" caused the audience to leave in droves. The Baylor President called Phelps into his office the next day and handed Rod a handful of telegrams complaining about Gardner's performance. Phelps had to write each sender and apologize for the remark. He had succeeded in getting Baylor to book Brother Dave because Gardner's uncle was a pastor who had developed the Sunday evening "Training Union" program then widely used in Southern Baptist churches.
Phelps went on to become an entertainment attorney and booked Brother Dave into a number of small town venues, including Temple, Texas, where the audience consisted of a number of President Lyndon Johnson's relatives. Gardner went off on then President Johnson and Phelps had to refund a number of patrons.
Phelps produced Brother Dave's last live concert on December 19, 1979, at Panther Hall in Fort Worth, Texas.
In the early 1980s Texas oilman H.L. Hunt moved Brother Dave and wife Millie to Dallas because of Gardner's proclivity to be a staunch conservative, and to not be afraid to "tell it like it was". Hunt soon became disenchanted with Gardner's alcohol and drug abuse and cut Brother Dave off.
Gardner mixed thought-provoking or confounding stand-alone one-liners, or 'zingers' (e.g., "An' I'm writin' a new book an' it's gonna be called "What Will the Preachers Do When the Devil is Saved?"", "Gratitude is riches, and complaint is poverty, and the worst I ever had was wonderful!", "Let them that don't want none, have memories of not gettin' any... let that not be their punishment, but their reward," and "Don'tcha know a diamond ain't nothin' but a piece o' coal that's stuck with it?") with satirical musings on his contemporary political scene ("...folks used to pray to God for rain, and now they call Washington,", "Say, a Democrat is somebody who expects somethin' fer nothin', and a Republican is somebody who expects nothin' fer somethin', an' a Independent is a cat that greases his own car," and "If I were bound by either party, well then, I might ferget America,"). He also told traditional, humorous Southern stories, the most notable among these being "The Motorcycle Story", "When John Gets Here" (also called "The Haunted House"), and his version of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar as set in Rome, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
.
Brother Dave got a good deal of comic mileage from his boosting of all things Southern, making him a latter-day version of Kenny Delmar's "Senator Claghorn
Senator Claghorn
Senator Beauregard Claghorn of Charleston, South Carolina, was a popular radio character on the "Allen's Alley" segment of The Fred Allen Show beginning in 1945...
" on Fred Allen
Fred Allen
Fred Allen was an American comedian whose absurdist, topically pointed radio show made him one of the most popular and forward-looking humorists in the so-called classic era of American radio.His best-remembered gag was his long-running mock feud with friend and fellow comedian Jack Benny, but it...
's classic radio show. He smoked cigarettes during his routines, describing them as "a Southern product," and declaring "I like cigarettes - I'd smoke chains if I could light 'em." He spoke of a Southerner's culinary fondness for "a Moon Pie
Moon pie
A moon pie or MoonPie is a pastry which consists of two round graham cracker cookies, with marshmallow filling in the center, dipped in chocolate or other flavors. The traditional pie is about three inches in diameter...
and an Ar-uh-Cee (R.C. Cola
R.C. Cola
RC Cola is a soft drink developed in 1905 by Claude A. Hatcher, a pharmacist in Columbus, Georgia, United States.- History :...
)." Anticipating the bottled-water market by almost 30 years, he remarked that, at Hot Springs, Arkansas, he had seen "some o' them ignorant, stupid Southerners sellin' water to them brilliant Yankees." He noted that the difference between a Northern Baptist and a Southern Baptist was that a Northern Baptist said, "There ain't no Hell," and a Southern Baptist said, "The hell 'ere ain't."
While Gardner did spin routines based on a wide-ranging social freedom, some of his material did play off racial stereotypes of his time. Often, he had African-American characters in his routines speak with an exaggerated, high-pitched, Butterfly McQueen
Butterfly McQueen
Thelma "Butterfly" McQueen was an American actress. Originally a dancer, the 28-year-old McQueen first appeared as Prissy, Scarlett O'Hara's maid in the 1939 film Gone with the Wind, then continued as an actress in film in the 1940s, then moving to television acting in the 1950s .-Early life:Born...
-style accent, as in "The Motorcycle Story." In another of his routines, a black woman exclaimed, "James Lewis, git away from dat wheelbarrow -- say, you know you doesn't know nothin' 'bout machin'ry!"
However, some people not familiar with the idiomatic Southern term "ol' boy" objected to Brother Dave's usage of it, thinking that the person referred to was a black man. But this was not so. In his story entitled "Rejoice, Dear Hearts!" an "ol' boy" who "drove for the governor" ruined the car on the first day because he didn't understand what the letters on the automatic transmission stood for. ("Well, we was both goin' about 80 and he tried to pass me, so I dropped it into Race!") Among Southerners, "ol' boy" then and now refers to a generally harmless, well-meaning, not-too-smart-or-overly-well-educated young or middle-aged man—usually Caucasian. It's not to be confused with the demeaning "boy" that in years past was used by some Southern whites to refer to a black male. Although Gardner's early-1960s albums for RCA Victor contained questionable racial humor, there is nothing like the overtly racist content of his late-1960s act.
Rediscovery?
After being out of the national limelight for many years, Brother Dave's contributions to American humor may see a comeback, due to the 2004 one-man play prepared and acted by David Anthony Wright, Rejoice Dear Hearts: An Evening With Brother Dave Gardner.In addition, his first four albums have been reissued on the Laugh.com label, and his routines can occasionally be heard on Sirius XM satellite radio channels Blue Collar Radio(SiriusXM 97) and Laugh USA (SiriusXM 96).
Selected discography
- Rejoice, Dear Hearts! (RCA Victor, 1959)
- Kick Thy Own Self (RCA Victor, 1960)
- Ain't That Weird? (RCA Victor, 1961)
- Did You Ever? (RCA Victor, 1962)
- All Seriousness Aside (RCA Victor, 1963)
- It's Bigger Than Both Of Us (RCA Victor, 1963)
- It Don't Make No Difference (Capitol, 1964)
- It's All In How You Look At "It" (Capitol, 1965?)
- Hip-Ocrasy (Tower/Capitol, 1968)