Some memories, though wrapped up in tragedy, are precious. This one is to me. It’s the memory of how I met my friend, the late, great Little Richard.
I was homeless in Los Angeles, many years ago. I sat upon Crocker Street all night long, camped out with my acoustic guitar and all my belongings, afraid to go to sleep for fear I would be robbed. I had to wait until morning to get into the Weingart Center shelter, the best one in downtown L.A.
I watched a long black limousine drive by, and my dark eyes filled with hope. One day I would ride in one. Somehow I made it through the night safely.
The next morning, I gathered my things and walked to the shelter to line up.
Suddenly that limousine pulled up in front of the shelter. The back window rolled down. Then a very familiar voice echoed through the smoggy air. It invited, “Gather ’round me, everybody.” He peeped his head out the window. It was the great singer Little Richard. And he had a hand filled with cash.
I was the first one over to him as one of his bodyguards got out of the limo to look after things.
“I have cold hard cash for you all till it runs out,” he announced and handed me a $20 bill. The others desperately reached and grabbed for the money he was handing out. I kept standing there as close as I could, and he winked at me.
“You’re a pretty thing. How did you become homeless, madam? Are you mentally ill? A lot of homeless women are?”
“You could say I’m just a little bit crazy,” I replied.
“I’ll bet you’re crazy like a fox,” he said.
“I’m a singer, Mr. Richard,” I said.
“Yeah, I see your guitar. I’ll have to hear you sometime.”
Just then, a big pickup truck pulled up behind the limousine. It was filled with food and hygiene products for the homeless. It was all Little Richard’s gift to humanity. He had a big heart. He even paid for the medical care for a homeless senior citizen who was stabbed twice, shot three times and robbed of his Social Security check.
One day, Little Richard sat in the back of his limousine and sang to some homeless people who were gathering in a small park in the middle of Skid Row near Crocker Street.
One time he told me, “You can’t stay on these streets, Madeline. You’re a rare flower. You’re going to wither up and fade away down here.”
Later on, I sat with him in the back seat of his limousine and sang the Otis Redding song “These Arms of Mine” for him a cappella.
“Yeah. Now that’s what I call music,” he applauded. “We’ll have to get you somewhere with a voice like that.”
So I was supposed to go to the hotel he was living in on Sunset Strip and meet a talent agent there. But I felt very ill from being on the streets and had to go home to my parents back up in Tillamook, Ore.
If I had been able to make that meeting and stay, who knows how far I could have gone, who I might have been.
Little Richard was a great man. He had a heart of gold, and golden as a million shining suns.
Goodnight Sweet King,
Love Maddy
A poem for Little Richard
By Maddy Brown-Clark
Goodnight Sweet King
You will be missed
May you never be forgotten
As long as music exists
Your love for humanity
Was big and broad
But now you have gone
To meet the Lord
When I hear Tutti Frutti
And Long Tall Sally
I'll dance to your music
And remember your beauty
And may all remember just one thing
You Little Richard were truly the King.
Maddy Brown-Clark is a former Street Roots vendor who now resides in Tucson, Ariz.
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