Schiller College

Bonnigheim & Heidelberg

Bonnigheim

Starting college in the fall of '69 was a pretty simple proposition. Load up all my guitars, amps & clothes and head for Bonnigheim on the other side of Stuttgart. Seems like it was a short trip.

The parking lot around the college was loaded with with parents dropping off their kids. Nobody paid much interest in my arrival until the back of the Dodge van opened and the amps were in evidence. Suddenly there were all these long hair types helping unload the gear in a sort of dazed, lackadaisical manner. My memories of the subsequent months at Schiller are somewhat less clear.

My best friends in Bonnigheim were Russ Bernberg, Petra Halens, Georgia McQuilken, Chris "Smiley" Cannizzo, Gayle Harp, Mario Estrada & Zandy Connor.

There was also a communal group known as "The Family" which I was part of. Typical group of freaks....good folks.

Russ and I shared a tiny room on the third floor of the "K-Bau." The K-Bau (18th century) was immediately adjacent to the main castle and was, originally, home for the servants, courtiers that served the Prince. So, naturally, our room was tastefully decorated and the perfect place to "study." And, for you detectives out there, here's your chance to play a form of "Where's Waldo?"

It was as typical as could be for the era. Most of us were involved in the Vietnam War Moratorium that fall. A lot of us were, like our revered President, smoking hash & doing acid. We remembered to inhale.

Time to be very clear here. Drugs were my life for almost five years. Met a lot of great people and had some interesting experiences. That I'm alive today is a documented medical / spiritual miracle. I wish I'd never touched a single drug. That was then and this is now.

Took a lot of trips both school sponsored and off on my own. The fall school trip was to Wien....ok, ok...Vienna. Most memorable were visits to Schönbrunn Palace and Freud's apartment.

Russ and I took off for London that fall too. Fell in love with the British Museum. Great museum. Evidently whenever the British conquered (during the Empire days) or brought another country into the Commonwealth part of the deal was the lucky country had to "donate" everything that wasn't tied down to the British Museum.

Not a bad way to get some pretty impressive exhibits!

We also made a pilgrimage out to Stonehenge. Seemed like the thing to do at the time.

Weird, inexplicable things seemed to happen all the time. We hitched down to see Led Zep at Zirkus Krone in Munchen. No tickets, just figured it would "happen" somehow. In the middle of a throng of about 200 people...peaking...suddenly the security line breaks...Russ and I pop through...we stood there, looked at the security guards....they looked at us...we look at each other, shrug and walk into the hall just as Zep is taking stage.

By the way, I'm not gonna give you one of those "yeah, I saw Zep back in the days when music was good...." stories. They were, in fact, really average, until the last 45 minutes. Page finally woke up or something. Saw Pink Floyd a week later in Offenbach and they killed.

Another trip involved a bunch of us heading up to Leysin to the American College of Switzerland. Russ's younger sister Brandi was up there as was my friend Hank (bassist for Sister Ray the previous year in Stuttgart). The day after we left Hank & some others were expelled from ACS.

I see no correlation between the two events.

The two faculty members that I remember best are Mr. Cloonan & Dean Alverson...mainly for things of an extracurricular nature. Can't remember a thing about their classes. Paying attention during my infrequent appearances in class was not my forte.

Heidelberg
Our campus at Heidelberg was the Villa Manese. The "campus" consisted of two buildings on the side of a hill separated by a garden.


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