The San Francisco 49ers had a chance to both host and play in the Super Bowl this year. The game, as we know, will not be in San Francisco, but worse, the Niners won’t even be suiting up in their Santa Clara locker room since they were eviscerated by the Seattle Seahawks last month.
So let’s think about other things. Let’s think about a time when the Niners did both host and play in the Super Bowl.
On Sunday, Jan., 14, 1985, Tony Bennett spent the day in San Francisco while our 49ers “hosted” Super Bowl XIX in Palo Alto. Even then, the NFL had washed its hands of Candlestick Park, our popular blue-collar home, by staging the Super Bowl at a second-rate college stadium. The people, parties and money were still in San Francisco, but the actual game and TV show, if you were rich enough to attend, was an hour away, squirreled inside the maze of Leland Stanford Junior University.
Tony “I-Left-My-Heart-in-San-Francisco” Bennett never left San Francisco that Sunday either. His famous song popped up during commercial breaks with shots of cable cars and the Golden Gate Bridge. But the artist formerly known as Anthony Benedetto had no role at the game. But I did.
I was in charge of driving three drunk vacuum cleaner salesmen to their hospitality tent in a Palo Alto parking lot.
Early that morning (5 a.m., thank you!) my phone rang with my auto mechanic shouting. “I’m two drivers short and I need help!” That week Walt had scored four limousines at auction — “gonna make some easy money!” — and bragged about the contracts he was bidding on.
I grabbed a decent sport coat and rushed to Walt’s “garage” on Market Street – a cinder block shack at the end of Guerrero Street tucked in the back of a narrow alley stuffed with broken cars and no room for the four used limousines double-parked and warming up on Market Street. For security, Walt kept a raccoon inside a small metal cage stuffed with apples. He opened the cage each night when he locked up.
That shack, 30 years later, is still there, abandoned, an anomaly inside the newly developed housing corridor.
“Thanks, man. You’re saving my ass. I got this contract yesterday morning from a Texas vacuum dealer who grabbed all four limos — no questions asked. Came in last night and paid cash!”
Walt always fixed my beat-up cars for cheap, so I told him I’d drive for free.
“Don’t worry. I’ll pay you something, but these guys should tip well.”
At 8 a.m., three guys in purple polo shirts piled into the limousine outside the Mark Hopkins Hotel on Nob Hill. I was given a map with a hand-scribbled “X” marking the spot I was tasked to drop these guys off. I’d barely eased onto California Street when the crew piped up.
“Hey, kid, what do you think of that Elton John?”
Another jumped in, “I don’t like anything that’s bi.”
Before I could respond the, first guy added, “I like biplanes!” All three roared with laughter.
I looked in the mirror and they were toasting and tipping silver flasks to their lips.
“I think a biplane is the only thing that should be bi.”
They laughed uproariously again. I didn’t know if they were actually drunk or if some unguarded stupidity had suddenly been unleashed. I didn’t take their bait, but they would never pause to let me try.
“Hey kid, can you play, “I Left My Heart In San Francisco?” You ought to find it somewhere in this fancy rig.”
I searched the dashboard and pushed the FM button. Suddenly, “Rocket Man” was blaring throughout the car. I quickly turned it down, but they shouted, “NO! Louder!”
The FM station kept the hits rolling, the traffic wasn’t bad, and the guys were laughing and singing. Maybe this would be easy.
“Hey, driver! We like you. How’d you like to make some real money?”
Not to be outdone, another said, “We could set you up in Frisco. Get your very own vacuum franchise. We’ll start you out at 29 grand a year.”
His buddy added: “Guaranteed!” I looked in the mirror.
“Maybe more,” the first one added with a wink, “especially since Frisco likes so many flavors.” They were on a roll.
“Hell, we could offer more if you sold to some bi’s!” They thought that was pretty darn funny, too. I figured these guys had probably won a prize for selling the most vacuums and won a couple nights in Frisco with VIP tickets to the Super Bowl.
“Thanks,” I shot back with a little (careless) disdain, “but I already make twice that much in construction. I’m a union tilesetter. Today I’m just driving for kicks.”
I immediately felt bad for trying to knock these guys down a notch. Besides: There went my tip.
At the stadium, there was a designated lot for the limos next to a delivery tunnel, where I watched the first quarter before they kicked me out. I returned to the car and climbed into the back seat, where I watched the rest of game on a six-inch TV while helping myself (generously) to the Heinekens I’d “found” in the “bar.”
At the two-minute warning, I disposed of the bottles, sneaked a piss on the back tire and found my way to the vacuum company tent. I was feeling pretty good. And my Niners were clobbering Miami, 38-16.
It was getting dark, but the vacuum guys were among the first to leave the stadium, so I tried a shortcut and managed to avoid any bottlenecks. These guys still had their energy going, and I could hear them popping the rest of the Heinekens and bashing the “shit****ing Dolphins.”
It was at this point that I realized I was lost in a residential part of Palo Alto. But, luckily, I spotted Page Mill Road and headed toward the scenic and faster I-280. But we were still on a municipal road, so one of the guys shouted:
“Where the **** are we? Shouldn’t we be on the freeway?”
“I decided to take you on the ‘Silicon Valley Shortcut.’ A route only the locals use.”
This got their attention. “There’s Hewlett Packard’s headquarters,” I pointed at the first barn I saw.
“You’re okay, kid. This is better.”
Highway 280 luckily came up fast and getting to Nob Hill was easy. The Heinekens were good for everyone’s mood.
There was a short line on California Street to enter the Mark Hopkins driveway. When my turn arrived, a very tall, very blonde, very short-skirted woman on the arm of a very short, very dark-haired man was slowly strolling up the middle of the red brick drop-off circle. One guy yelled. “What’s taking you!! Honk, damn it!”
I gave the horn a little toot and the dark-haired man turned around, looked me straight in the eye and gave me the finger.
The vacuum guys went nuts. “Run him over!”
“Wait,” I tried to interrupt. “That’s Tony Bennett!”
“No shit! Let us out!”
So I did.
Coda:
1) The only other time I “met” Tony Bennet was many years later at a private fundraiser at the Democratic Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. I was there as labor chair of the California delegation for Barack Obama’s second nomination, and, yes, he sang “I Left My Heart….” I was reminded of his heroic civil rights stances of the 1960s where he even marched in Selma. Tony usually stayed at the Fairmont Hotel across the street from the Mark Hopkins. He was booked many times to sold-out shows in the Fairmont’s Venetian Room. A kind, gracious entertainer. R.I.P.
2) I received no tip from the vacuum guys.
Hot damn, Tim !!
You sure can write.
Who knew that during all those years of watching you rep the working man.
That first SF Super Bowl I was a painter at the Kenmore, a boarding house on Sutter catering for foreign tourists, two of whom I eventually married.
After the Niner win my buddy, Roscoe Robinson loaded a bunch of young international visitors into his old van and we cruised the hot spots ending up in the Castro where mobs climbed all over Muni vehicles and each other which led a jaded young brit (Roger Bucher, who was adorned with an Italian beauty (Alessadra Doveri) who made Gina Lollobrigida look skinny) …
“This is better than London after we won the World Cup !!”
write more,
h.