Thanksgiving Day at Alice’s Restaurant

Thanksgiving is a time for food, friends, family and football of course, but for this radio guy who started in the business at classic rocker  WTOS FM in Maine, it also meant I was going to get to play one of the best songs ever and not get a tongue lashing from the program director. You see, Arlo Guthrie's evergreen holiday classic, "Alice's Restaurant" is 18 and a half minutes long and it just wasn't good radio to play it other than Thanksgiving Day. ( Because of the length, it is hard to catch it on the radio these days, but I'm sure our Townsquare Media brethren in Binghamton will "spin" it a couple of times this week.) Since I was the new guy at the station and there actually had to be a live DJ in the studio in those days, I had to work the holidays. Thanks to Guthrie, I didn't mind at all.

Originally released in 1967, the song tells the true story of the day after Thanksgiving in 1965 when an 18 year old Guthrie and his friend were arrested for littering. The song was the title track of Arlo's debut album and inspired a feature film in 1969.

See the rest of the true story of that fateful day in this article.

After the pumpkin pie and coffee, it's off to Alice's Restaurant for this baby boomer. Oh, and it was incredible to see Guthrie perform it live at the Earlville Opera House a few years ago.

Happy Thanksgiving Officer Obie!