Ep.5 - The Little General
Listen to full episode:
Kimmer and the daughter of another Silver Chain founder, Nola, tell Paul about how their families functioned at times as one family unit, and even celebrated Christmas together. They paint a picture of Nola's mother, Cheryl, as a control freak they nicknamed "The Little General."
Paul learns more about Cheryl and her husband Jerry when he interviews Nola's younger sister Pam, who lives on a houseboat on the Mississippi, where Pam rocks Paul with the story of how she first realized her parents were swingers.
Episode 5 Transcript
COLD OPEN
In the spring of 1977, Carol and George drive an hour and a half north from their suburban St. Paul home to Central Minnesota’s largest town. A place that at the time had a population of 39,000. The town of St. Cloud.
St. Cloud has the state’s largest city-owned hydroelectric dam, is the birthplace of 1978’s Miss Minnesota USA – – and is home to Minnesota’s third largest public university, which is the very reason for Carol and George’s visit. Here’s an excerpt from an article written by George in the May 1977 newsletter.
“George”: On Thursday, April 21, three members of the Executive Committee including Cheryl, Carol and myself had the rare opportunity of being invited to St. Cloud College’s Alternative Lifestyles class to discuss swinging.
The students questioned us for over two hours. While we were not there to convert students into swingers, we did show that other sexual preferences were not bad just because they did not agree with everyone’s beliefs.
Let’s just pause on this for a second. This completely secret society, where members are forbidden to reveal one another’s identities, a group that doesn’t even swing at the dances, this club’s leaders are speaking in public. At a university in a modest sized town that’s not known for being liberal. The fact that this school even has an Alternative Lifestyles class in the 1970s is pretty shocking.
As the article notes, there is one other Silver Chain member who attends this discussion panel with Carol and George. A woman named Cheryl, who along with her husband Jerry is another one of the club’s founding couples.
Over the years, Cheryl and Jerry, along with their two daughters Nola and Pam, become so close with Carol and George’s family that they begin their own family traditions. Here’s Carol’s daughter, Kimmer:
Kimmer: So December 23rd, we would get at either our house or their house and exchange gifts. And I instituted dressing up. It was fun.
I have this really cool photo of me sitting on the floor in my gown because I'm dressed in a floor length gown...
A few of the kids even blend their last names together as a lighthearted sign of their unity.
In fact, Cheryl and Jerry’s older daughter Nola remains close friends with Kimmer to this day. So much so that Nola attends Carol’s online memorial.
Nola: Your mom. Was always there, always help me sort out things that, as a kid. You just couldn't… Do on your own and you needed a female adult help that, you know,, the general just was not going to do.
Kimmer: For a moment of clarity, the general is Nola's mother.
Nola: Her nickname was earned. The little general came by, honestly. She was a taskmaster at best.
THEME MUSIC
I’m Paul Ditty, and this is Time Capsule: The Silver Chain.
Hearing Nola’s emotional speech about Carol at the online memorial reminds me of that old adage “one child’s shitty parent is another child’s treasure”. Because honestly – didn’t we all have that friend’s parents who seemed a million times cooler and more capable than our own? Even when our friend told us they weren’t all that?
And for Nola, Carol’s memorial also represents a friendship that she never would have had without The Silver Chain’s existence. A sisterhood that’s lasted fifty years.
Nola: We knew that The Silver Chain was the reason that we were all thrown together.
Kimmer: Yeah, well, all I know is your parents brought you guys over to our house, and the four of you come in the house, and we didn't even know you were coming. and I was in eighth grade, but you kind of got dumped on us and it's like, okay, go do what kids do.
As the two eldest girls in a pack of seven kids, Kimmer and Nola are elected for a job neither of them wants.
Nola: Okay. Let's say it together, Kim. We hate Babysitting.
And the teens aren’t just looking after their own siblings. They’re also stuck with the unruly offspring of other swinging couples.
Kimmer: I did not like Mike and Mary because they did not pay me well enough to take care of the two year old.
Mike and Mary's kid is the one that we lost
MUSIC
Nola: This child was running around the house like a banshee.
We had tried everything we could, And so finally we had cordoned him off to his room, And and Kim and I closed the door and we both slammed our bodies against it, going, Oh, okay, fine. Next thing we know, it wasn't too much longer. Later, Jim looks at us and goes, Why is there a kid running down the street?
Kimmer : We lost the kid.
Nola: So now we're trying to, we're running around the neighborhood trying to find. And meanwhile the parents come home and we had to actually admit that their child got out. Well, needless to say, we never got that job ever again, which was just fine with us.
The two-year-old is found. Unharmed. But this conversation – it’s one of many examples of Kimmer and Nola as kids – living within the periphery of their parents’ swinging group – Barely ever really talking about it. Yet bound by it to this day.
A few days after my first conversation with Kimmer and Nola, Nola surprises me with an email filled with a collection of scanned old snapshots. Aside from the black and white pixelated photos in the newsletter, this is my first time seeing photos of not only her parents Cheryl and Jerry, but The Silver Chain’s founding members. The Executive Committee.
And after hearing about this woman nicknamed The Little General and finally having a face to match the name? Well, I can kind of see it. Cheryl is petite and grins ear to ear beside her husband and the other three founding couples all in matching powder blue outfits – all sewn by Cheryl herself. But beneath that smile there is definitely a commanding presence
Even though it’s Carol’s written word that takes up the most real estate in The Silver Chain’s newsletter, it’s only Cheryl – as the club’s treasurer – who is fearless enough to list her full name in each newsletter, along with the directive to make all checks for member dues and dances out in her name. You can’t get a membership card without Cheryl’s involvement. And if that’s not Little General energy, I don’t know what is.
But I’m not the first to follow this clue. Here’s Jack El-Hai, the author of the GQ article about The Silver Chain.
Jack: The only one I tried to reach was the the Treasurer. Because her name was given in full in some of the newsletters and hers was the only one. So I tracked her down to the senior residence where she was living. I called there, asked for her, was put in touch with her daughter, who said that she was not in a condition to speak.
The obvious assumption -- for Jack and myself -- is that the newsletters left in that safe deposit box must have belonged to Cheryl. As the only person willing to put her full name in the newsletters, why wouldn’t she keep them in a safe place for posterity?
Only Cheryl is unable to answer this question because as you may recall. She passed away in 2019.
So after my talk with Kimmer and Nola, I reach out to Nola’s younger sister Pam. and I’m pretty psyched when Pam agrees to do an interview. Only it’s on her boat in Minnesota, where Pam and her husband spend their winters.
Pam: I know it's kind of strange. I love party questions. So where do you live? In the water in Minnesota. In the winter. In the summer, we go to Maine. So they have that reversed.
It has its challenges, like when it floods, when you're flooded over and you'd have to kayak to shore. Except the thing was it still froze in overnight in March. So you'd punch through the ice and to get yourself to shore
Fortunately for myself and Nora and Jeyca – our production team – it’s springtime when we venture to Pam’s boat. And we’re excited. This little microcosm within a metropolitan area is almost like an amusement park.
Paul: Hi, Pam.
Pam: Yeah, Nice to meet you, too
Pam, her husband, and their dog, welcome us with open arms and a lovely dinner of salad and spaghetti bolognese.
The fact that they make serving a two course dinner for five seem effortless is all the more impressive because living on a boat – every centimeter of space is accounted for.
Pam: This one we thought. This is the boat. Mostly because of this kitchen.
Okay. Three burners and a little oven. It's wonderful.
So, you know, climb in. This is our estate room, which is the bedroom.
Paul : And now you can go.
Nora: I'm so tall.
Paul: Right. You've never been taller in your life.
Pam: There's one more fun thing is our toilet. I know people aren't excited, but I am.
This is a composting toilet. Oh, I love. So you pee and it goes in the front. Yeah. And we have to change that bucket. And then you poop inside here and it just smells like dirt. Yeah. Which smells so much better than all the other ones that we've had. So there you go. In this we can poop in that for two months, because 98% of your poop is water. So it evaporates out and we turn it and just ---
Paul: Wait. 98% of your poop is water.
One thing’s for sure: Pam’s houseboat feels a world away from the nearby Bloomington home where Pam and her older sister Nola were raised.
Pam: It's the regular rambler that everybody has. So it was small, but it had two bedrooms and a den.
And we pretty much lived in a monoculture. All my friends lived in the same type of house.
It’s the kind of life – filled with the newfound promise of suburban upward mobility – that initially attracts Pam’s parents, Cheryl and Jerry.
Pam: My mom grew up really poor. She would say that. And her dad was a schoolteacher and he couldn't make it as a living, being a schoolteacher. So when my mom was seven, they moved out of the school house life and moved to the big city of Menominee. And then he worked for Sanitary and he made little miniature marshmallows.
And then my dad grew up in a very fundamental Christian home under the thumb of my grandmother,
My parents always felt like they were squashed in their liberation in being free. And that's why they moved from Wisconsin to, you know, metropolitan Minneapolis, you know, in one of the suburbs. So they were moving up in life and leaving their past in Wisconsin. And then they could move and be... I don't know, I think they wanted to be hippies, but they're too old to be hippies.
Even though Cheryl and Jerry are set on chasing the lost days of free love, they still gotta pay those bills. Jerry works as an aerospace engineer while Cheryl is a part-time receptionist, and with that comes a strict regimen for Nola and Pam.
Pam: My sister had to play piano before mom and dad left. And I had to get my piano in before they left. And Dad left at 730. So probably Nola, I start at 630, I started at seven and then our piano was done and then they'd leave the house at 730.
I'm at school at 9 and get home at 330. Walk in the door and you gotta call Mom on the phone from where she's working and say you're home. And then she left a list of to do's.
So we had these napkins and you'd sprinkle them and layer them, put them in a bag wait a day, take them out and iron them. And if they weren't ironed perfect and I mean lines to perfect, she would come up to the stack you just did and go (pwghbh!) And throw them on the floor and say "I think you can do them over better the next time."
One of the deceptive things about housing tracts is that – as much as the houses all appear the same – the world inside each two bedroom one bath rambler is completely different. This holds true every time Pam walks into one of her friend’s homes. Once she looks beyond the architecture, she sees far more differences than similarities.
Pam: I didn't know that people actually sat at a dinner table together and ate all the time. That was pretty amazing to me because my parents ate in the kitchen and we ate in the living room
I mean, yes. I ate with my parents. But a lot of families I knew had a kids table in the other room. Sounds somewhat normal, right?
Pam: If my mom's going to go grab something off the counter, my dad's going to come up behind her and grab her tits. You know? I-- he'll put his hand under her skirt all the time. It was definitely-- and my mom... It wasn't like, "Get away." It was like, "Oh, yeah. This is fun." So they were definitely sexually obvious out in the open, except when my friends came over. You know, I don't think they ever saw that. But yeah, so it was--the they were really lovey dovey and then they'd argue. So they go from one extreme to the other of arguing.
Paul: Did you see your-- your friend's parents being that physical with each other?
Pam: No, never, never, never. And I didn't hear my friend's parents argue. My parents argued and argued. And my mom's not going to back down. And she's not going to say it's her fault. She's not going to say "I'm sorry." She didn't say "Thank you." Or "Sorry." Those are the two words that I learned from other families.
so you just don't know what it's going to set off a really flared "ahhhh", you know, just really... High emotion.
We never said, "Wait til your father comes home." It was always, "Wait till your mother comes home."
In Pam’s world, children are to be neither seen nor heard. But at this point in her life, that’s really all she wants. To be seen and heard. By her parents.
Pam: One time I was at a band concert -- my ride forgot me and I called crying and they’re at bridge and I'm thinking, okay, now my parents are really going to show up to a band concert because I got to get there. And my mom goes, "Hold on, I'll call you right back." She goes, "Yeah, the neighbor boys comin' over to drive you." I'm like, Oh, all right.
Pam: My dad did make it to one band concert. Not my mom, but my dad did. Gets all done. He goes, "Man, if I knew you were that good. I would have come more." Like, Well.
Like what parents don't bring their kids to their band concerts?
Paul Ditty: That sounds very lonely.
Pam: It was lonely.
They really didn't like keep tabs on us. Like I keep so tabs on my children and they were going up, my girlfriend and I, we can hop on our bikes and bike all the way to downtown Minneapolis and back and nobody cared.
Just to be clear: we’re talking about elementary school-aged kids taking an at least 20-mile round trip bike ride. From a suburb that still has dirt lots and unfinished roads to the downtown area of a real city. Without bike lanes because: 1970s.
But Cheryl didn’t care where her kids were. She cared about a properly ironed napkin crease. She cared about morning piano practice. And she cared about her and Pam’s annual “talk.”
Pam: She'd say, "Okay, let's go to the basement."
MUSIC
Pam: So our basement, you walk down the steps, you turn right, there's a curtain. And in that curtain is my dad's workshop. In his workshop are Playboy bunny centerfolds all through all around every four walls and the ceiling.
And so there was a bed and there's a chair and tables and you'd sat at the chair with the table and then Mom would have a book. She always had visual arts with her. So-- so when you're in kindergarten, you just get a book. This is a penis. This is the vagina. Great. And then the books get bigger and more pictures.
It’s around this same time that Cheryl and Jerry make a whole new set of friends.
Paul : What do you first remember learning about The Silver Chain?
Pam: Hmm. Oh, well, it was a social group where you make newsletters and you fold up envelopes and you stamp them, and you send them out. And people come to your house, the four couples, and they're very sweet and nice. All those couples were nice. And I felt like they talked to me as a person as opposed to not being in the room. So I felt very welcomed by the other couples for sure. I loved all of the the other silver chain adults.
they have what's in common, this group that they all hang out with. A dance group. so that was easy for me to understand as a kid. Like in fifth grade. Oh, they're in a dance group.
Pam’s like every other kid at that age in that – you meet a lot of people your parents know. But whatever it is your parents are doing with these friends pales in comparison to the onset of puberty, crushes and the endless struggle to fit in. So Pam takes the inclusion of Cheryl and Jerry’s new friends at face value. They’re not only nice enough, but they do fun family things too. Like go on picnics. And camping trips.
Pam: This is when Silver Chain was just starting. And so we'd be in a tent and you'd come out in the morning and be like, Where did Mom go? Or Where did Dad go? And then my sister's three years older, so she's always smarter than me. She'd always have to say something like, Well, duh, you know, our moms with their dad. And that's all she would say.
MUSIC
Pam: In seventh grade, I came home early from something, and I shouldn't have been home. and I opened the door and my mom's downstairs, a bunch of cars in the parking-- in our driveway. And she yells up, "Don't come down here!" Like... "Okay. I won't."
So I didn't go down. And then I was to stay in my room and I followed directions really well. And then the next morning I had to clean the basement And I go down there and there's all these chairs in a circle and everybody's got a towel on their chair. And, That's when I put it together. So it wasn't till I was 14 and like, "Oh, I see. That's what that mean. That's what that is. Oh. That's what a swinger is. Oh." And I just remember looking in the basement going... "Oh!" It just hit me like a ton of bricks.
MIDROLL 1
ACT TWO
Pau: I just want to make sure I understand the timeline. You come home unexpectedly. There's a bunch of cars in the parking lot. You're told to stay in your room the next day. You're told to clean.
Pam: It turned on when I had to clean up the towels. That was the light bulb.
Paul: I feel like your mom knew what she was doing.
Pam: Hmm.
Paul: I feel like she wanted you to know.
Pam: Oh, I do feel that, too.
And then I'm like, "Oh, well now do I-- I don't tell anybody. No. I'm not going to say a word." And then in high school, though, I started having real emotions about where I came from and other families. And... Then I let my girlfriends know that my home life isn't so good.
My family's not normal. I know now. And I'm not going to ask questions because I don't want to have to go in the basement and have a talk.
Instead, Pam initiates a different type of basement talk.
Pam: So in high school, my girlfriend and I started a Bible study
I would never invite them to my house. So we took turns at everybody's basement. Basement? Can you imagine coming to my basement for Bible study with centerfolds Some people might ask me once in a while, and I said, Well, I wouldn't know if my dad's drunk or not on the counter, which is true because he would go in stupor like a two month stupor. He was never really a drunk because he only drink after five. He never lost his job and he was a really good employee. That's his idea that he's not an alcoholic, but he would be asleep on the table by 8:00 because he drank from 5 to 8 like two months at a time, and then he'd snap out of it… He might not drink for maybe a week and then slowly build back up till he gets to his part and crash and burn. That's his cycle.
Paul: What was that like for you to watch?
Pam: It was depressing because I'm daddy's girl. And then so my dad being loving and kind and all those other things couldn't show up when he needed to because he would be drunk somewhere. Or he he would promise you the world. I cannot say the word. I promise. And with my children to they say, promise me. I'm like, I'm not going to promise you because I want to make sure that I you know, if I promise you something, it's going to happen… l I don't use that and I don't get excited before vacations because they might not happen. I don't get excited before something because it might not happen. I wait till I get there and then I'm super happy we are here. Yeah, I don't look forward to things and I've worked on that a lot.
Like most teenage girls, Pam doubles down against what her mother envisions as the right life for her daughter. Only in this case, the one who’s acting most like a rebellious teen is Cheryl.
Pam: I'm going to not have sex before marriage. I'm going to just block that whole sex thing out. And if any boy did want to kiss me, I just would say nothing. And that was all through junior high. And then in high school, when I got a little older and I had more serious boyfriends. My mom gave a condom to my boyfriend, and I was probably 17-- maybe 16, 17--and he showed up. I guess my parents are always gone at night, you know... Showed up at my house, this kind of, "Hey, look what your mom gave me. She gave me permission." I'm like, "Well, you got permission from the wrong person. And like, you are out."
MUSIC
Pam: I left at 17 and my friends took me in because they knew it was really getting bad at my house. So like, you can come finish your senior year out over here and my parents like goood see you later, get a job, pay rent or move out, go like, all right. So I did.
Once Pam’s on her own, her interaction with her parents is kept to a minimum. She gets married, has two kids and lives happily ever after.
MUSIC
Okay, that’s the Hollywood ending I want for Pam. She’s so kind. And sitting on her houseboat – while her loving husband stows himself away in a tiny bedroom for hours so we can conduct this interview – it’s clear to me that as of today she’s found happiness.
But this handsome man who loves Pam dearly. A man she met at bible study, which is just so cute and totally Pam. He’s Pam’s third husband. The road for Pam to reach this contented life was a long one.
Pam: I would definitely say my mom tended to have some sex addiction stuff going on. And then that never was taught in school that that could be a thing. And they go, oh, well, if you're you know, if you have addiction in your family, you'll probably marry an addict. And I am not marrying an addict. Make sure nobody drinks or smokes or I'm as straight laced as you can be. And then nobody told me you could be a sex addict.
So of course you know what happens next right? Pam marries a sex addict. When Pam sees the old familiar patterns in her parents' life now seeping their way into her first marriage, she gets a divorce. And then dates, marries and divorces – another sex addict. At this point, Pam has two young kids. And it’s her desire to protect her son and daughter that helps to bring about a life change. Pam joins a codependency for sex group, and with it gains a whole new set of coping skills.
Pam: I, I let their, my own kids figure out their dad. I kept them safe. They had a cell phone. If anything happened, they could call me and say, come pick me up. And I did. And I said, These are the behaviors I want you to watch for.
Give me a call if if you're getting berated. If you're not smart enough. Cute enough, bright enough. Didn't do it right. Not perfect enough. And you're crying. You call me. You know, so all those. And so I would definitely was driving over there and my ex would open the door. Oh, I see. They don't want to be with me anymore. Like, no, I'm just coming to pick them up.
I would go to group and I get big and then I could pump myself up big for that one moment because I am not big. I'm the baby of the family and I walk away. But I couldn't walk away. Yeah. And I didn't.
As Pam’s finding empowerment in her codependency group and ending her second marriage, Jerry asks Cheryl for a divorce.
Pam: So my mom was calling me. My dad was calling me and it's like, do you guys know that I'm going through the same thing? Like, does anybody know I'm doing the same thing? But no. And then later, like, my mom calls me, just your dad. And I got together, and he was just so gentle, like, I don't want to hear about you guys having sex, okay? I just don't want to hear about it. So that was so they still met up for sex after they got divorced and they still were cordial to each other so I could have them at a family gathering and they wouldn't be mad or crabby or anything with each other.
And then a couple of years later, I wasn't really talking to her and she wanted to have a relationship because she's in Al-Anon now and doing 12 steps and wants to do all this therapy with me, you know, like I'll go. So I went one time and her biggest question was, Um, when are you going to stop being mad at me? And I said, I don't know because no, give me a date. Give me a date that I can look forward to. And I'm like, all right, ten years from now, just ten years. It is like I yep. Ten years. And that's the best thing she could have ever done for me because she dropped it. She finally stopped pursuing and just saying, when you're out, you're all your problem is all your fault. So after that, I felt a huge release And then probably a couple of years later, I'm like, All right, I don't need to be mad anymore. Fine. I know you want a relationship. We'll do the best we can.
MUSIC
Paul: How much of the tension with your. parents. Do you think it had to do with their parenting versus their swinging lifestyle?
Pam: I think their parenting came from their parents. My mom's mom had Huntington's. And so if you have Huntington's, you have this edge to you.
And my mom was on that path and her mom was on that path. And I believe her mom's mom was on that path because so the family stories of angry women and irrational behavior and suicide and that in the Huntington's family is a thing. And so I always knew my grandma had Huntington's, and I didn't know till later that my mom did.
For those of you not familiar with Huntington’s, I could simplify and tell you that it's a neurodegenerative disease typically passed down from one generation to the next. But that doesn’t quite spell out the triple whammy that Huntington’s does to a person’s motor, cognitive and psychiatric capabilities. Starting first with psychiatric indicators that include a reduced display of emotions, increased aggression and both obsessive-compulsive and hypersexual behavior.
Pam: I didn't know that until I was 30. And I went to her Huntington's doctor appointment and they said, Oh, yeah, she would have some signs of any types of these traits. Did you see that when you were growing up? And I'm like, I wish someone would have told me.
Paul: So she must have had it from a very young age.
Pam: Probably around her 30, they say, usually like manifest that mental part around your 30 mid thirties, which is right when I was being born. Right when I was growing up.
Cheryl isn’t diagnosed until she’s 62. At a point where her Huntington’s has begun to manifest itself physically, resulting in jerky and uncontrollable movements similar to Parkinson’s. Cheryl’s behavior also becomes even more erratic. She wants to disown Pam one moment, then calls a week later to beg for forgiveness.
Pam: And then my mom had a stroke and the stroke scrambled her Huntington's in a good way. So cut out the anger part and it replaced this really passionate, loving, caring person who said, I love you.
Paul: So how did it feel to hear her say. That she loved you.
Pam: It was weird. It's like, okay, well, I love you too, Mom. I mean, it was just one of those awkward moments, and, like, who is in there…?
At this time, Nola is living in Georgia, far from her mother and the pain of her childhood.
______
Included in the safe deposit box that held The Silver Chain’s newsletters is a four page, single-spaced typed listing of the group’s by-laws, penned in January 1974 by The Executive Committee. And It takes me a few times to get all the way through it because, as obsessed as I am with all things related to this group, this document contains a lot of admin. I doubt most of these swinging couples bothered to read it, except –
There is one bylaw, listed innocuously at the bottom of the fourth page, that catches one member’s attention four and half years later:
Female Reader: Should the organization, known as the Silver Chain, cease to function in the future for any reason whatsoever, all assets of the Silver Chain shall come directly under the custody of the Executive Committee.
That’s when the question is raised: if and when the founding couples decide to leave the group, what will be left of The Silver Chain? Here’s an excerpt from the front page article of the May 1978 newsletter titled “Contingency Plan Needs Some Consideration”:
Male Reader (mildly alarmed?): It was learned that neither is there a contingency plan for the club currently nor has the Executive Committee planned on forming one in future years. While it is comforting to know the current Executive Committee has no plans to disband anytime in the near future, it is a frightening thought to also know I cannot take for granted that the club’s functions and organization will always be there.
Once again, I’m back to that question: Why did The Silver Chain end? In Jack El-Hai’s article, he suspects it was early reports of AIDS. Which is a possibility, but it doesn’t align historically with the last newsletter on record. In June 1978. Kimmer thinks the club started to shift when one of the four founding couples, Mike and Mary, left when Mary became pregnant with their second child. Carol told me it was drugs. And Pam supports that theory.
Pam: So the only thing I know about it is that it just wasn't what it was. And my dad was funny. And when did he see? He didn't do drugs before The Silver Chain, but through The Silver Chain. He told me one tiny story. Then he went to a party and they were doing drugs, which he told me never to do drugs, and he did drugs. And then he realized that that's like it was great and wonderful, blah, blah, blah. But that that's not what he that's not his life he wanted to be in. And that's what The Silver Chain he thought was starting to bring in people that they didn't know. And it just wasn't it wasn't a small little nuclear cute group.
Pam tells me that even after the club broke up, the core couples continued their friendships. Going on trips. Meeting for afternoon bridge games. It feels like it maybe Cheryl’s connections from The Silver Chain morphed into more traditional friendships. And that maybe Cheryl, like so many others I spoke with, had a change of heart about her swinging lifestyle.
Pam: No way. No, no. My mom. No, she's in the nursing home, and she goes, you know, if you just drive me down town, I know where to find a gigolo. She's in a nursing home after having a stroke?
No, she was definitely a willing participant and right at the forefront of that whole thing.
Pam and I look at The Silver Chain’s newsletters, and what she’s reminded of most is the close relationship her parents had with Carol and George. Closer than I imagined.
Paul: Las Vegas Trip. Fun, exhausting but successful.
Pam: Mm. Good.
Paul: By Jerry B and Carol P.
Pam: There you go. Two peas in a pod.
Paul: Really?
Pam: I don't know. Yeah. My mom loved George, so I.
Paul: Think Carol's.
Pam: Husband definitely swapped a lot. But my mom loved George to the point of, like, George and Carol. They're so sweet. They come to see my mom in the nursing home, and, of course, my mom has Huntington's and a stroke. And so she goes, Hi, Carol. Hey, George. Carol, can you leave and let us have a long time? And I don't know what you wanted in a long time, but Carol's like, cute. So Carol and I walk out, we just chat and, like, I have no big deal. And so she wasn't shy about who she really loved. Especially when you have no filter anymore. Mm hmm. You know, like, I love you, George, but. Yes, I know.
So just to clarify, because it’s confusing. And almost like explaining a soap opera plot to a nonviewer: Carol and George, a married couple, swapped partners with Cheryl and Jerry, another married couple. Which means Cheryl’s husband Jerry had a thing with Carol and – the way Pam tells it – Cheryl could not get enough of Carol’s husband George.
MUSIC
When Cheryl passes, a brief tribute is printed in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. At the memorial, George brings the photos of Cheryl and the other executive committee members of The SIlver Chain. Pam adds a few photos from Cheryl’s collection…
Pam: So when they went on their trips and I only saw their pictures, some of their pictures afterwards, but then when they die, you get to see the other pictures, you know. So lots of nudie pictures in our family that we that I got rid of.
Until meeting Pam, I always thought Cheryl would have been the one with the biggest need to keep these newsletters locked in a safe deposit box. Her full name is in every newsletter. But if you’re keeping nude photos of not only yourself but your closest friends stored in your home, this theory no longer makes sense. Because if you didn’t destroy them the next morning, wouldn’t you at least keep those stored in a safe deposit box as well? And we’ve learned that Cheryl embraced the lifestyle, even late in life. So no, it’s safe to say the safe deposit box is not Cheryl’s.
Pam and I look at a photo that Nola sent me just weeks earlier, of the entire gang aboard a sailboat, all wearing matching yellow t-shirts emblazoned with the words Naughty Nauticals. Jerry looks like he’s having the time of his life. He’s young and happy, and a little drunk.
Pam: His last day before he died, I was in the hospital, and the night before he died, he said, Can you break me out and get me a beer?
If I would have known it was was the last night, I would have probably, smuggled a beer in. But anyways, I said, No, Dad, I'm sorry, there's no beer in the hospital. And he goes, Well, hang and have a heart attack tonight. And I'm like, okay, let's see our goodbyes now. He was okay. And he goes, You think I'm going to heaven? And I said, Yeah, I think you're going to heaven. What are all the wonderful things that you can think of that you helped people? And it was, yeah, I helped all the neighbors. I said, You certainly did. And he certainly did. And so he goes right out. I won't see you tomorrow. I mean, okay, let's give our hugs now. And he had a heart attack that morning when I came in.
MUSIC
Pam: He went to his grave not wanting. Like he's not an alcoholic in his world. He's just not. He drinks, he gets drunk, he falls down. It's no problem. And that's just how he chose his life, that his lifestyle. So he just passed away. His ashes are right up there because I don't know what to do with them. Like do you have a party, says Jerry Berger, right there.
Paul: Oh, there they are.
Pam: Hi, Dad.
Paul: We're talking about you.
When Pam and her husband walk us out, we’ve talked for FOUR hours.. And there’s still so much left unanswered. Pam suggests that some of the older kids - like Nola and Kimmer - will recall more.
But during my follow up conversation, Nola and Kimmer mention something about The Silver Chain that I never before would have considered.
Nola: Somebody's daughter joined.
Kimmer: Yeah, it was Donna. Gunnar and Donna had their daughter, lived with mom and dad for a while when she was learning to be a farrier.
I'm almost certain that it was. It was Judy.
Judi. A woman that Nola and Kimmer say followed the path of her parents. And - once an adult - also joined The Silver Chain.
Kimmer’s recollection of the exact time Judi lives with Carol and George is from 1979-1980. Which means if Judi was part of The Silver Chain, it was still up and running well after that final newsletter on record from June 1978. But there’s really only one person who can answer this.. .
Judi: Hello?
Paul: Hello? Is this Judi?
Judi: Yes, it is.
I’m Paul Ditty, and this is Time Capsule: The Silver Chain
Time Capsule is hosted and written by me, Paul Ditty
AND is a production of Diversity Hire Ltd and CYSA Productions, in collaboration with Feelings & Co.
Our Executive Producers are Jennifer Goyne Blake, April Shih and Jack Huston.
Our Producers are Marcel Malekebu and Nora Mcinerny
Jordan Turgeon and Eli Makovetsky are our co-producers AND
Our Engineer is Eric Romani
Time Capsule Theme Music is composed by Louis Stephens
Are there things you’ve always wanted to know about The Silver Chain but were always afraid to ask? This week, the club’s Founding Executive Committee answers pressing questions at timecapsule.substack.com. Visit us to join listener discussions, hear bonus episodes and more.
This show is inspired by a GQ article titled “The 70s Swingers Club and the Secret Archive it Left Behind” from writer Jack El-Hai.
Special thanks to Lori Williamson and The Minnesota Historical Society for access to The Silver Chain’s newsletters.
Segments from this episode were recorded at Podcast Place Studio in Long Beach, California.
Next Time on Time Capsule: The Silver Chain:
Henry: Back in those days, we we were doing a little bit of the white crosses.
Paul: What’s the white crosses?
Henry: Speed.
Tammy: Oh, I think a lot of white crosses.
