(Feb. 4, 2016) For four decades, the name “Jocko” meant one thing in the greater Berlin area: it was time to dance.
Born in 1933, Francis “Jocko” Graye grew up during segregation, in a time when the color of your skin dictated what schools, business and shops you could go into. Until the 1960s, even Ocean City was closed to many outside of three designated “colored excursion days” after the summer season.
Within those segregated areas, however, music became a unifying force in the black community, and Graye knew he wanted to be a part of it. In 1955, he was discharged from the United States Army. He remembers buying a turntable and a small one-tube amplifier that fit in the trunk of his car.
“I couldn’t learn how to play no instrument, but I always loved music. One thing I could do was play records,” he said.
Two shops he was allowed into were Uncle Ned’s Bargain Fair in Berlin and Watson’s Smoke House in Salisbury, where he shopped exclusively for records. At the time, each cost between 25 and 30 cents.
Graye loaded up on 78s, borrowed a name from popular deejay Jocko Henderson from Philadelphia’s WHAT-AM radio, and started booking record hops in Maryland, Delaware and Virginia.
“In 1953, before I even started playing records, I was living in New York and working in New York,” he said. “I used to listen to his station, and he talked so much trash. I thought, I’m going to call myself ‘Jocko’ too – Jocko on the scene with his record machine.”
His first record hop was at Miller’s Inn in Germantown. Other shows soon followed at the Multipurpose Building, Green Top Inn, Raymond Joseph’s, the High Hat, Masonic Hall and the Duncan-Showell American Legion Post 231 in Berlin, along with the Roadside Inn, Grand Terrace and Bridge Club in Ocean City, and Rosedale Beach and the Savoy in Millsboro, Del.
Over the years, Graye played records in countless venues across the peninsula, from Pocomoke, Snow Hill and Princess Anne, to Anne Arundel County and Horntown, Va. His audiences ranged from senior groups to schoolchildren, and crowds often swelled well into the hundreds.
“However many could get into the place,” Graye said. “You packed it in – there wasn’t any capacity.” Admission was 35 cents, and Graye might expect to make $25 in a night.
Advertising was largely done by word of mouth. If the show had a sponsor, that business might put a few flyers up on a telephone pole. The rest was by reputation.
It wasn’t unusual for an impromptu dance contest to break out – or a “Soul Train” line – with popular dances back then including the slow drag, the mashed potato, the slop, the jerk, the monkey, the dog, the funky chicken and the twist.
The records Graye played were almost all early rock ‘n roll and soul music, especially James Brown, Louis Jordan, Junior Walker and the All Stars, the Temptations, Sam Cooke, Dinah Washington and Brook Benton.
“The main man was James Brown,” Graye said. “You put on something by James Brown and everybody hit the floor.”
In 1971, Marion Black released “Go On Fool,” a record that Graye just had to have. He called around to the local shops, but came up empty.
“I had a record hop at the multipurpose building that night and I didn’t have that record, so I called up to Cherry Hill, N.J.,” he said. “They said they had it, so I told them I’d be there in two-to-three hours and asked them to hold it for me. All that for a 45.”
That night in Berlin, at midnight, he played “Go On Fool” for the first time in public.
Graye also developed his own style, often heckling his most-loyal fans.
“As they were dancing, I might say, ‘alright Greg, come on!’ Whoever was out there, when they came in the door I would call their name. That was part of it,” he said.
When he wasn’t traveling on weekends, Graye worked with mentally handicapped children at the Stockley Center in Delaware for more than 30 years. More than a few times, he put on record hops for the center for the children.
He also raised three of his own children with his wife, a beautician, and remembers the first time they were old enough to join him at the Masonic Hall.
“It was just so much fun,” he said.
Graye said he never changed his format, all the way up until his last record hop in 1995.
“That’s why I stayed out there so long,” he said. “A lot of people wasn’t into rap and stuff like that – my crowd wasn’t. I stayed the same with my good, old-fashioned soul music.”
By the end, the people who first came to see the Eastern Shore’s own Jocko had families of their own, and his fandom had grown and evolved with him.
“Their great-grandchildren was fans of mine, and it would move right on up,” he said. “I went through many a generation with the music that I played.
“And I had a style all of my own – that’s why I stayed out there so long,” Graye added. “I never sat down to play a record. I always stood up. And I always thought I was easy to like. I always got along with people, never had no problems. If it was a good time, I would be a part of it.”
His last performance was on a Saturday night in 1995, at the American Legion in Berlin.
“You couldn’t even get a parking space on Flower Street,” Graye said. “I’ve still got a lot of fans out there right now that would probably like to see me get back started again. But I’m out of it now. I got tired and just gave it up.”
According to Graye, he hasn’t spun a single record since that night, and he no longer owns a turntable. What he misses most are the crowds of people dancing to his favorite records.
The Duncan-Showell American Legion Post 231 will host a dinner honoring several of its members, including Graye, on Feb. 20, in Berlin. Tickets are $25 and are available through the Legion and its auxiliary.
Berlin native Gregory Purnell, who helped organized the event, remembers attending some of those early “Jocko” record hops.
“Jocko would always have the record that was the hottest thing out, and for a time he was the first and only of his kind,” he said.
“Francis was an icon. Generation after generation after generation danced to that music that Francis played. It kept us with a purpose,” Purnell continued. “Back then there weren’t these lines that are drawn now between Snow Hill or Pocomoke, Delaware or Maryland – music always brought us together.
“We want to show our appreciation for what Francis did for the community. Music united our community, and if you said ‘Jocko,’ the building was going to be full.”
Born in 1933, Francis “Jocko” Graye grew up during segregation, in a time when the color of your skin dictated what schools, business and shops you could go into. Until the 1960s, even Ocean City was closed to many outside of three designated “colored excursion days” after the summer season.
Within those segregated areas, however, music became a unifying force in the black community, and Graye knew he wanted to be a part of it. In 1955, he was discharged from the United States Army. He remembers buying a turntable and a small one-tube amplifier that fit in the trunk of his car.
“I couldn’t learn how to play no instrument, but I always loved music. One thing I could do was play records,” he said.
Two shops he was allowed into were Uncle Ned’s Bargain Fair in Berlin and Watson’s Smoke House in Salisbury, where he shopped exclusively for records. At the time, each cost between 25 and 30 cents.
Graye loaded up on 78s, borrowed a name from popular deejay Jocko Henderson from Philadelphia’s WHAT-AM radio, and started booking record hops in Maryland, Delaware and Virginia.
“In 1953, before I even started playing records, I was living in New York and working in New York,” he said. “I used to listen to his station, and he talked so much trash. I thought, I’m going to call myself ‘Jocko’ too – Jocko on the scene with his record machine.”
His first record hop was at Miller’s Inn in Germantown. Other shows soon followed at the Multipurpose Building, Green Top Inn, Raymond Joseph’s, the High Hat, Masonic Hall and the Duncan-Showell American Legion Post 231 in Berlin, along with the Roadside Inn, Grand Terrace and Bridge Club in Ocean City, and Rosedale Beach and the Savoy in Millsboro, Del.
Over the years, Graye played records in countless venues across the peninsula, from Pocomoke, Snow Hill and Princess Anne, to Anne Arundel County and Horntown, Va. His audiences ranged from senior groups to schoolchildren, and crowds often swelled well into the hundreds.
“However many could get into the place,” Graye said. “You packed it in – there wasn’t any capacity.” Admission was 35 cents, and Graye might expect to make $25 in a night.
Advertising was largely done by word of mouth. If the show had a sponsor, that business might put a few flyers up on a telephone pole. The rest was by reputation.
It wasn’t unusual for an impromptu dance contest to break out – or a “Soul Train” line – with popular dances back then including the slow drag, the mashed potato, the slop, the jerk, the monkey, the dog, the funky chicken and the twist.
The records Graye played were almost all early rock ‘n roll and soul music, especially James Brown, Louis Jordan, Junior Walker and the All Stars, the Temptations, Sam Cooke, Dinah Washington and Brook Benton.
“The main man was James Brown,” Graye said. “You put on something by James Brown and everybody hit the floor.”
In 1971, Marion Black released “Go On Fool,” a record that Graye just had to have. He called around to the local shops, but came up empty.
“I had a record hop at the multipurpose building that night and I didn’t have that record, so I called up to Cherry Hill, N.J.,” he said. “They said they had it, so I told them I’d be there in two-to-three hours and asked them to hold it for me. All that for a 45.”
That night in Berlin, at midnight, he played “Go On Fool” for the first time in public.
Graye also developed his own style, often heckling his most-loyal fans.
“As they were dancing, I might say, ‘alright Greg, come on!’ Whoever was out there, when they came in the door I would call their name. That was part of it,” he said.
When he wasn’t traveling on weekends, Graye worked with mentally handicapped children at the Stockley Center in Delaware for more than 30 years. More than a few times, he put on record hops for the center for the children.
He also raised three of his own children with his wife, a beautician, and remembers the first time they were old enough to join him at the Masonic Hall.
“It was just so much fun,” he said.
Graye said he never changed his format, all the way up until his last record hop in 1995.
“That’s why I stayed out there so long,” he said. “A lot of people wasn’t into rap and stuff like that – my crowd wasn’t. I stayed the same with my good, old-fashioned soul music.”
By the end, the people who first came to see the Eastern Shore’s own Jocko had families of their own, and his fandom had grown and evolved with him.
“Their great-grandchildren was fans of mine, and it would move right on up,” he said. “I went through many a generation with the music that I played.
“And I had a style all of my own – that’s why I stayed out there so long,” Graye added. “I never sat down to play a record. I always stood up. And I always thought I was easy to like. I always got along with people, never had no problems. If it was a good time, I would be a part of it.”
His last performance was on a Saturday night in 1995, at the American Legion in Berlin.
“You couldn’t even get a parking space on Flower Street,” Graye said. “I’ve still got a lot of fans out there right now that would probably like to see me get back started again. But I’m out of it now. I got tired and just gave it up.”
According to Graye, he hasn’t spun a single record since that night, and he no longer owns a turntable. What he misses most are the crowds of people dancing to his favorite records.
The Duncan-Showell American Legion Post 231 will host a dinner honoring several of its members, including Graye, on Feb. 20, in Berlin. Tickets are $25 and are available through the Legion and its auxiliary.
Berlin native Gregory Purnell, who helped organized the event, remembers attending some of those early “Jocko” record hops.
“Jocko would always have the record that was the hottest thing out, and for a time he was the first and only of his kind,” he said.
“Francis was an icon. Generation after generation after generation danced to that music that Francis played. It kept us with a purpose,” Purnell continued. “Back then there weren’t these lines that are drawn now between Snow Hill or Pocomoke, Delaware or Maryland – music always brought us together.
“We want to show our appreciation for what Francis did for the community. Music united our community, and if you said ‘Jocko,’ the building was going to be full.”