Readers reacted by the arena full to my last Backstage Past piece, “Dazed and confused,” in the March 31 edition of the Courier, which dealt with the oft-told story that Led Zeppelin had once played Eric Hamber secondary school in March 1970, based on a photo in the school’s yearbook that year.
As some of you might have seen, my friend Squire Barnes from Global BC TV also did a segment on the story. In the weeks prior to the Courier piece coming out, I had told Squire about the bizarre tale and he became just as fascinated with the myth as I had, suggesting we have our individual pieces be published and air in conjunction with one another. In turn, it appears from comments (some even irate) that a few wondered if this was all part of an elaborate joint effort between the Courier and Global to pull an early April Fools’ joke.
The day the Courier piece came out, Barnes interviewed former student Edward Lerner, now a doctor based in Tsawwassen, who said he took the photo at Led Zeppelin’s Pacific Coliseum concert in 1970.
Any inkling there was more to the myth was further quashed a day later, when upon hearing about the story, Barb Jones, a student and activities editor for the Eric Hamber yearbook committee in 1970, came forward and admitted the yearbook photo of Zeppelin supposedly performing at the high school was indeed a joke.
“I loved your article. The research you did was extensive,” Jones wrote in her email. “I had absolutely no idea that we had started a rumour and that it had persisted.”
Jones fondly recalls putting together the annual that year, literally using cut and paste techniques far before computer desktop publishing was ever a thing, noting the Zeppelin item in the yearbook was always meant to be playful, with a satirical youthful bent typical of the period.
However, there remained a group of hardcore Zep-believers who were young students in 1970 who continued to insist they saw a band — some band — playing on the Eric Hamber auditorium stage that year. Their eyewitness reports (along with other factors mentioned in the original article) originally gave credence to the idea that Zeppelin had played at the high school. A couple of readers finally came forward to seemingly clear up that final piece of the puzzle.
A well-known local group called Spring performed a noon-hour concert at the Eric Hamber auditorium in 1970. Comprised of a number of respected session players, Spring had formed in 1969, released a few singles, were courted by A&M Records in the U.S., and even recorded a shoulda-been-a-hit called “A Country Boy Named Willy,” which was produced by Terry Jacks in 1971.
One reader commented that he recalled the show going 10 minutes overtime, with Spring squeezing in their last song, their single “As Feelings Go,” at the end of their set, leaving teachers to complain students were drifting back late to their classes after the concert.
So it’s perhaps a little sad to finally burst the Zeppelin dirigible, and solve the Eric Hamber mystery. But maybe if you do remember Eric Hamber in 1970, you weren’t there, man…
Now there’s just that other old rumour going back decades about Point Grey secondary being initially built as a women’s prison….
aaron@aaronchapman.net
