Category: My Vintage T-Shirt

My coming of age began in earnest on June 30, 1996, in Pecatonica, IL, at the Winnebago County Fairgrounds near Rockford. Desperately trying to do things that would be considered cool by fellow grade school classmates, I bought tickets to attend Lollapalooza, which at the time was a traveling music festival. Parodied by The Simpsons and embraced by the MTV generation, it captured the zeitgeist during the pre-internet days in the late 1900’s. Along with my two buddies, we’d somehow convinced one of their mothers to drive us over 100 miles from home so they could spend the day sitting ... Read more

Living legend Ronnie “Woo Woo” Wickers During the 2001 Major League Baseball season, I worked as an usher at Wrigley Field making $4.50 and hour which was the minimum wage back then. It took me more than an hour to get to the stadium on public transportation from my home in the suburbs. I’d listen to a Phish CD on a Discman with anti-skip technology while being bumped into by all the fans heading to the game. The most appealing part of the job was that I’d get to watch my favorite team all season while being paid to do ... Read more

Buying an original T-shirt can be tricky, but nothing beats having in hand the original you bought at the time. This is particularly true if you bought it directly from the band via mail order, as is the case here. Now, that might be an impossible bar to overcome for many, but for a T-shirt hoarder and folder like me, who tends to obsess, this is an easy one. From the first time I saw them live, I loved Spacemen 3. So, in 1988/1989, I wrote to the address on the back of the record sleeve, and in return, I ... Read more

If memory serves correct, the first concert I went to without parental supervision was a Suicide Machines show at the Metro in Chicago in 1997. Some friends and I took the Green Line from Harlem/Lake in Oak Park down to the Loop, transferred to the Red Line, rode it up to the Addison stop, walked past Wrigley Field, and found ourselves at the doors of adolescence. Thirteen years old with a pack of Newports that a homeless fellow purchased for me, a long chain wallet hanging off a pair of gaberdine slacks, and my brother’s brown Chuck Taylors, I was ... Read more

My Vintage T-Shirt is a section written by our readers. Thanks to Shawn Keeler for sharing these shirts and a wonderful story about a legendary artist and dad. If you have a rare vintage t-shirt and a great story please contact us. My father Ira Keeler worked for Lucasfilm, also referred to as Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) from 1981 to 2001. During his 21-year career, he worked on many films. Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, the Back to the Future trilogy, the Indiana Jones trilogy, E.T., and Roger Rabbit, just to name a few. Ira collected many letters, photos, ... Read more