Bob Gibson (musician) - The Road To Chicago

The Road To Chicago

Bob Gibson was born on November 16, 1931 in Brooklyn, New York. He grew up in various communities outside New York City - Tuckahoe, Yorktown Heights, and Tompkins Corners, Putnam County, New York. He had two siblings - an older sister, Anne, and a younger brother, Jim. His early interest in music was, primarily, vocal. He left high school in his senior year and hitchhiked around the country. Eventually returning to New York City, Gibson became a partner in a firm that taught speed reading where he was responsible for sales and public relations. In 1953 Gibson met Pete Seeger, helping Seeger to complete rebuilding his home. Gibson was so impressed with Seeger and his music, he "took the money I had set aside for rent" and bought a banjo. After deciding to leave his job, Gibson taught himself to play the banjo over the next year, became immersed in the study of folk music, and became a performer at the age of 22. After performing briefly in New York City, he traveled to Miami, Florida and played in various clubs. Next, Gibson performed from Cleveland to New York and was eventually hired at the Green Door in Michigan City, Indiana (50 miles east of Chicago). He then found an agent in Chicago and was booked into the Offbeat Room in Chicago.

Gibson was soon tapped as house singer at Chicago's Gate of Horn where he was often joined by partner, Bob (later comic actor, Hamilton) Camp. Shel Silverstein, then a cartoonist at Playboy, was a regular fan and captured Gibson's attention when he (Silverstein) completed lyrics to a previously forgotton Gibson tune. Gibson and Camp were such a resounding success that the owner soon decided to open a similar place in New York named The Village Gate. He discovered two brilliant young talents, later to be known as Peter and Paul of Peter, Paul and Mary fame. Art then asked Gibson and Camp to "sing with a girl." They refused and thus was born the legendary trio of Peter, Paul and Mary. Peter Yarrow said of his friend Bob Gibson: "When you listen to PPM, you are hearing Bob Gibson".

They (Gibson and Silverstein = "GibStein") became lifelong best friends as well as writing partners producing over 231 songs over the next thirty five years. Their last production was in Nashville in 1993 entitled "Makin' A Mess" for Kyle Lhenning at Asylum records. The last cut; " Whistlers and Jugglers and Singers of Song" is the only song that today gets air play and was a last minute substitution when Shel realized how ill his friend really was. It was written about the relationship of what Silverstein referred to as "The trio from out of our past" about a girl who always loved the singer and with whom he got together several years prior to his passing.