We're all about the history of rock & roll at BoomtownAmerica.com!

Every week, we present “ROCK REMEMBERED,” a deep dive into the hidden history of rock & roll, the stories behind the artists and songs that changed the world. Join host, “Boomtown Bill” Cross each Wednesday at 7 pm (Eastern) with an encore broadcast on Saturday at noon (Eastern).

Join us this Wednesday as we reveal "The Origins of Classic Songs!"

While most of us remember 1967 as “The Summer of Love,” the hippie movement actually got its start a year earlier. It was also in 1966 that the word “psychedelic” entered the popular lexicon followed very shortly by the first “psychedelic rock” appearing on the nation’s Top 40 airwaves.

One of the earliest of these psychedelic hits was a little number called “(We Ain’t Got) Nothin’ Yet” by a Bronx band calling themselves the Blues Magoos.

At the time of their one and only hit, the Magoos consisted of Emil Thielheim, who used the stage name “Peppy” Castro, on lead vocals and guitar, Mike Esposito on lead guitar, Ralph Scala on organ, Ron Gilbert on bass and Geoff Daking on drums.

“(We Ain’t Got) Nothin’ Yet,” written by band members Esposito, Gilbert and Scala, was released on the Mercury label and went all the way to #5 on the Billboard Hot 100. Powered by the single, their debut album, Psychedelic Lollipop reached #21 on the album chart.

But like so many recording acts, the boys were not able to duplicate their initial success. They recorded four more albums and released a dozen more singles – all of them stiffed. In 1970, they threw in the towel and disbanded. As the years passed, many of the group joined other bands, but never found mainstream fame. In 2008, three of the original members (Castro, Scala and Daking) reformed the group and the Blues Magoos have been touring the world ever since. In 2014, they released their first album of new material in 43 years, titled Psychedelic Resurrection.

In television’s early days, the hands-down, most popular, can’t miss genre was Westerns. Especially when it came to kids’ programs.

One of the many lies that TV peddled so easily in those more innocent days was that the American West was somehow virtually unchanged from its post-Civil War heyday. Sure, there might be telephones and here and there a jeep to help with the ranching, but people still preferred to ride horses and settled their disputes with a good ol’ six-shooter.

One Western that bucked that trend was Sky King, who not only didn’t ride a horse; he didn’t even ride in a car. No sir. Sky King help keep law and order along that still untamed frontier in an airplane! Not just any airplane – but in the legendary Songbird!

Right off, how fortunate was it that his parents thought to name him Schuyler (a.k.a. “Sky”) and that his last name was King? I mean, talk about wacky coincidences!

And while he didn’t ride horses, he must have been raising them because, like any self-respecting Western hero of the 1950’s, he lived on a ranch, the Flying Crown.

Sky wasn’t actually a lawman. He was just a private citizen with a private plane (first a Cessna T-50 and then a Cessna 310-B). Lucky for him (and us), the local sheriff was always needing his help and he had a niece who frequently got herself into trouble.

Sky was played by Kirby Grant, a little long in the tooth (already in his 40’s when the show began) and just a wee bit beefy to make an ideal Western hero. But we hardly noticed. His niece, Penny was played by Gloria Winters. Every so often Penny’s brother, Clipper (played by Ron Hagerthy), would show up just to relieve the monotony of constantly rescuing Penny.

The show actually got started on radio in 1946 (with a totally different cast). It made the jump to TV in 1951 as a Sunday afternoon show on NBC. It moved to Saturday mornings on ABC in 1952 and then actually moved to a prime-time slot on Mondays during the 1953 TV season.

When ABC cancelled the show in 1954, it remained in production and began selling to local stations in syndication.

Production ceased in 1959, but the show continued on as CBS broadcast reruns as part of its Saturday morning line-up (sponsored by Nabisco) all the way until 1966. Most Boomers remember the show best from this CBS run.

For years, there were rumors that Kirby Grant had actually shacked up with his younger co-star Gloria Winters after the show ended. As titillating as that thought might be, these rumors were not true.

Gloria actually married a member of the Sky King production crew, Dean Vernon and settled in California.

Kirby Grant and his wife Carolyn moved to Florida, where he founded the Sky King Youth Ranches of America that provided homes for abandoned and orphaned children. He died in an automobile accident in 1985 on his way to Cape Canaveral to watch a space shot.

That was ironic as many of America’s astronauts have claimed they first got interested in flying by watching Sky King.

Many male American males have claimed they first got interested in girls because of Sky’s niece, Penny (see “Pencil Thin Mustache” by Jimmy Buffet).

We’d like to think that somewhere the Songbird is still out there, patrolling those “Western skies!”

When we were growing up, did any of us not either have this game or play it at friends’ homes?

The term “cootie” was first coined by U.S. soldiers during World War I. They used it to describe any of the various vermin like lice and bugs that infested the trenches in which the war was waged. When they returned after the war, they brought the term home with them. Kids, in particular, liked using it.

Cootie, the game, was created in 1948 by a Minneapolis postman named William Sharper. Sharper liked to whittle and the first “cootie” was whittled by him as a fishing lure. When he finished the lure, he got the idea of turning it into a kid’s toy.

Sharper had a little store where he sold homemade popcorn machines. He started selling his wooden cooties there. After a year of pretty good sales, Sharper decided to build a game around assembling his somewhat oversize critter. He formed the W. H. Sharper Manufacturing Company and began creating his cooties in plastic. He approached Dayton’s, a local department store, and got them to carry Cootie on a consignment basis. By the end of 1950, Dayton had sold nearly 6,000 sets of the game, not bad for a local product with no advertising. Those sales convinced a distribution company to begin carrying Sharper’s creation nationwide. By 1952, over 1 million Cootie games had been sold. Thereafter, Sharper’s company sold a million a year until well into the 1960s. As time passed, Sharper added other games to his line such as Tumble Bug, Inch Worm and Busy Bee.

Eventually, Sharper sold his creation to Tyco Toys in 1973. By 1976, Hasbro acquired Cootie which it still sells to this day.

So, raise a glass to the only cooties any kid really wanted to have!

Few people realize that it IS possible to overdose on certain vitamins. Here's a few you might want to watch out for:

Vitamin B6: More than 100mg a day might cause nerve damage

Vitamin C: One study indicated that consuming high doses of Vitamin C increases the risk of developing kidney stones among men

Vitamin D: Taking over 10,000 IUs a day may lead to problems like loss of appetite and kidney problems

As always, consult your medical professional about any vitamins you may be taking.