Fish Family

It's Peter, look'n for anyone who knew the Fish Family, heard of them or was a former/original member. That would be Lyoid (not sure if I spelled your first name right, sorry), Barbara, Paul, Nora, Barbara, me (Peter), Steve, Puerto Rican Mark, and Annie STP/Fish also known as Olvie or Olbie Anna. If I left anyone out, my apologies, it was a long time ago and no one was ever really sure who the originals were, not even us.

 

It's kindda late and I'm a little tired so if my sentences seem a little run-on and my thoughts are a little muddled, my apologies once again. But if any of the brothers or sisters from the family happen to come accross this thread I thought I might try to jog your memories about the family itself and who I am in it.

The radical leftist tradition was my contribution to the family especially when it came to issues about work. My ideas were countered by the rest of the family who led by Lyoid initiated meetings of the "5th International" from which I was excluded. My exclusion from these meetings was an attempt by the family to stop me from spewing my left wing rhetoric which was making everyone sick.

To this day I don't know what the Internationals were or whether they ever went up to the 5th.

I'd welcome the opportunity to talk to anyone else about the Family whether or not you were a brother or sister if you are interested.

 

I knew Paul several months before the Family got started. He used to crash upstairs from me with Kenny or maybe you might say he used to crash upstairs from me with Casey. Nobody ever stopped to think who was in possession of the apartment upstairs. Casey was a girl. Kenny lived with "his" girlfriend Leslie and Casey or maybe Kenny and his girlfriend Leslie lived with Casey. Casey and Kenny and Leslie were all friends and Paul and I both liked Casey. I lived in my own apartment downstairs from them by myself. George the junkie moved in with Kenny, Casey and Leslie a little later on. Any of this sound familiar to anyone. Anyone out there know any of us or remember anything about this. It's not a soap opera. It all led up to a most unique Family.

 

OK, I knew some peeps from the upper west side before I moved to the East Village where the Family was conceived and born.

There was Nancy, Lawrence, Joel, and Luke and Joeann. Luke and Joeann were a couple and Joel and Lawrence and I all liked Nancy.

Lawrence and Nancy were both from Detroit; Luke was originally from France, and I think he grew up in Ohio but also lived in the city at some points. Joel and Joeann were both from Long Island and I was and am from Jersey, New Jersey. The Boss and I went to Highschool together our freshman year.

Anyone recognize yourself/us yet. Feel free to chime in if you do. Even if you don't recognize yourself or us and you want to say something anyway, feel free to do so, be my guest, please!

 

I've always had doubts as to whether the Fish Family exists or existed anywhere but in my own mind, but if it exists or existed in my own mind it can be brought into existence in other's minds.

 

The Family dubbed me Wallace Beery. I think Steve was largely responsible for that. Wallace Beery to my understanding was some good looking, heartthrob showman from the silent film era.

It used to infuriate me when they called me Wallace Beery. I didn't think I was very good looking but then Barbara was drop dead beautiful and she liked me; so maybe I did have some good looks. Thanks brothers and sisters Fish for trying to build my confidence way back then even I had no idea what you were doing. I know what you were doing now, and that's what matters.

 

OK, I was mistaken. A good friend informed me last nite that Wallace Beery was not particularly good looking and that he was better known for his tough guy persona. Also, that he may have been in silent ira films but he was definitely in the talkies.

So, now it is 2007 and I have come to a different understanding once again of what the Family was trying to do back in 1970. To use a hackneyed word, the Family is still "reinventing" itself after all these years.

Now I'll have to think that Barbara liked me not because I was good looking but because I was a tough guy; one persona is farther fetched then the other. Well, maybe the Family was just goofing on me and Barbara just liked me because she did. Stranger things have happened!

 

Albert Fish's family?

 

Hi crud3we4re,

If you are talking about a "biological" family that is Albert's; No, it is not his Family. If you are talking about a famlily of men, women, and or children (much to my regret there were no children in the Family when I was part of it) that were or are brothers and sisters, and mothers & fathers to each other but are not related biologically/genetically then it might be Albert's Family. I don't remember Albert personally but that doesn't mean he wasn't part of the Family. Also, and this is my hope, the Family may have continued and grown after I was seperated from it; so Albert may have been part of it after the original members started it.

 

hm I could've joined?

 

You couldn't really have "joined" the Fish Family. It wasn't like a club or anything, but you could very well have been part of it. The Fish Family just sort of came about spontaneously. I don't mean to be pretentious. The birth of the Fish Family was defintely eons removed in the magnitude of its importance from the beginning of the Universe, but if you believe in the Big Bang theory, the "principal" of how we got started is similiar. Random events had been brewing for what seemed like an eternity in our minds and in the minds of many others, and then at some point a lot of events came together very quickly with a lot of force and we became what we were and hopefully still are!

 

I do believe in that. Sounds very interesting. What kinds of things did you all do? Was it like a commune?

 

I'll be more than happy to talk to you about some of the things we "did" another time but first if you'd like to listen I'd like to tell you some things "about" the Family.

Although, Lyoid gave us our name after we all ate some tuna fish sandwiches in which he had put STP, we were not primarily a drug family. Peace and love was a much bigger part of what we were about but, (and other members of the family might dispute this), we were not primarily a family grounded in peace and love either.

My perception of the family, keeping in mind that I was only one member of an extremely diverse group of what was originally about eight people, was that peace and love were very fine ideals but not as practical as human understanding.

With all the conflict in the world at that time (around 1970) chief among them, the War in Vietnam and the race "war" in America, I thought that one had to begin at the place where there was the best chance of getting something done. The Family began its journey on the road to human understanding. We tried to understand ourselves and those around us and to spread that understanding. Simultaneously but on a secondary level we sometimes found, promoted and lived in an atmosphere of peace, love and harmony. I guess harmony would have been more important to us than peace and love.

It's getting late and I have to get some sleep. Talk to you during daylight if you'd like.

I checked out your web site briefly. I know it is highly sophisticated but I couldn't figure it out (probably because I'm not very web site savy). However, without knowing what it was about I had the impression that it had the potential to move in a positive direction. Don't let your site get too fishy. LOL

Sorry if I'm patronizing you. We all have some of that in us. There are other things that are far worse.

peter

 

OK, I already mentioned the people I knew on the upper west side. I became acquainted with these people just prior to 1970. All of them were extremely helpful in creating the conditions that led to my evolution into and the part I played in the evolution of the Fish Family.

Joeann was about my age, nineteen. Luke, Joel, and Nancy were all twenty three or so, and Lawrence was thirty. Our ages are relevant because during that time a lot of hippies and counter culture people were torn between accepting or not accepting the idea that you couldn't trust anyone over thirty.

From the benefit of hindsight, I can tell you that if I had known more people back then, not who were just over thirty, but even those a lot younger than me, my life today would be much more fullfilling. That saying that you couldn't trust anyone over thirty may have been foisted on the hippies and the counterculture by the establishment in an attempt to seperate us from a resource that could have been invaluable to us. Back in the day if we hadn't been so suspicious of people over thirty, they could have had an empowering, enobbling, and enlightening influense on us.

 

I'll start with Nancy. She graduated from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor with (I can't remember which) either highest honors, summa cum laude, or it might have been second highest honers, magna cum laude. She had a double major, physics and South East Asian studies. Her father was a fireman.

 

Now Lawrence. Lawrence went to a junior college in the midwest, either in Michigan or Indianna, not sure which; I think it was in Fort Wayne which I believe is Indianna, but I could be wrong about that. Lawrence had a brother who I think was a commander on a nuclear submarine, or at any rate his bother was on a nuclear submarine. His brother was dieing of cancer and as Lawrence explained it, it was an old (Italian?) tradition to marry your brothers wife if your brother died. Lawrence's brother was married and Lawrence was planning to marry his wife. Lawence's father worked in the car factories, either GMC or Ford.

 

Joel. He swung both ways. He had gone to Boston U. for a time and was taking courses at CCNY. Joel liked a lot of people in a lot of different ways, not to mention the least of which was sexually. He was the only one of us as far as I know who ever connected with Nancy. His father was a stock broker.

 

Luke came from a long lineage of lawyers. He went to college in Ohio briefly, I think it was Ohio University. His family lived in Ohio then. In 1969 Luke was going to Pace college for the Visual Arts, which is where he met Joeann. His family actually had a coat of arms. His own father or it might have been his step father was a lawyer. His mother was French and had a continental accent.

 

Joeann. All of us loved her. As fate would have it neither her nor Luke were letting any of us, or anyone else come between them. Eventually Luke and Joeann got married and Joeann became a kindergarden teacher. We all went to the wedding!

 

A slight diversion!

There is another Family on the Forums that is posting to their own thread. So, I would like to excuse myself to them in this thread for promoting my own agenda. In my defence, it's not always a bad thing to promote your own agenda.

Sorry, hippiestead and luvione, but I feel compelled to say a word about a man who was my friend. I was fortunate to know and be friends with this man. He played a part in shaping a group that was not only part of the counterculture back in the late 60's early 70's but was one of the only groups that came out of that ira that still endures today. I'm talking about your family, The STP Family.

Zap, brother man, I haven't forgotten you. More power to you if you come across this thread!

peter