with two performances by the Dark Star Orchestra approaching, and a film about Jerry Garcia’s death on the way, Deadheads recall the day we lost Jerry

A performance by the Dark Star Orchestra always brings Grateful Dead fans out of the woodwork. But the cover band’s upcoming shows at the Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom on Friday, June 1, and Saturday, June 2, will bear special significance for Deadheads. Camera crews will be on scene shooting footage for the film “Losing Jerry,” which is slated for release in 2008. Written and directed by New Hampshire native Mitch Ganem, the film takes place in Hampton and traces the lives of three friends who follow the Dead for 15 years until Jerry Garcia’s death on Aug. 9, 1995. “On the day Garcia died, with Bob Weir playing the Casino in Hampton Beach, those two very strong personal worlds of mine collided in a way I could never have imagined,” Ganem said recently. “How could I not make this film and how could it be shot anywhere else?” In anticipation of the film and the Dark Star shows, The Wire called upon Deadheads from across the country to describe their recollections of the day Jerry died. What follows are eight personal stories, starting with the director.


The day Jerry Garcia died was a crystalline summer day. I remember the color of the sky, the twinkle of the light on the ocean and the faces and voices of my friends. The answering machine filled up, shock and denial morphed into reality, which was nothing but overwhelming sadness. Suddenly, the music of The Grateful Dead—the soundtrack of my adult life—was everywhere. Every car that rolled by, every open window, every radio station on the dial sang in homage to our departed friend. I truly felt like I had lost one of my friends. That was the magic of Jerry Garcia. He was a virtuoso musician, a gifted and generous player, a musical prankster. But he was also strangely accessible. I never shook his hand and he never said a word to me, but I knew he was and always would be my friend, there every night for me with that beaming smile and that soaring guitar. Was I crazy or delusional? If I was, so were several thousand others. The energy and affection that radiated from Jerry (everyone was of course on a first name basis with him) was pure and unwavering. He didn’t demand attention or affection. He just played his guitar and sang his heart out and if he moved you that was fine. If he didn’t, that was fine too. He just did what he did and left the rest all up to you to decide.
—Mitch Ganem, writer and director of “Losing Jerry”

I remember receiving the news of Jerry’s passing sometime after noon on Aug. 9, 1995. I was doing a bunch of mundane paperwork on a sunshiny day with clear skies and moderate humidity—a perfect beach day. I was looking forward to finishing the paperwork so I could head out early to Hampton Beach to catch Bob Weir’s band, “Ratdog,” at the Casino Ballroom. Little did I know how valuable those tickets would be.
I was sitting down at a table mulling over figures when I received a phone call from my wife. “Jerry died,” she said simply.

The overriding feeling I had from the moment I heard the news was one of disbelief. I realized that his death had happened, but it just didn’t register. I wanted to treat his death like a temporary problem that we could get past with enough work, as if by singing and crying together we could bring him back to life. During the car ride to the Casino, my friends and I had mixed emotions. We wanted to laugh and sing along with the Dead songs on the radio, but we also understood that things would not be the same. It was comforting to arrive at a place where fellow Deadheads were congregating, because I was among family who “knew.” Aside from sporadic outbursts of exuberance, the show really was like a wake. Bobby opened the show by declaring that our dear departed friend had said that music can get us through the bad times, and it was in that spirit that we assembled.

For me, the most poignant song was “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door,” which included a lyric I had not heard before: “Come dry these tears from my face / I can’t shed them anymore.” At the end of the show, the spontaneous crowd chant of “You know our love will not fade away” must have lasted for 15 minutes. I didn’t want the chant to end, because I knew that as soon as we left the building a special bond or connection would be altered.

Grateful Dead lyrics continue to jump out of the songs and engage me in wonderful and curious ways. The Terrapin Station question of “Is it an end, or beginning?” a lyric Jerry sang so often, seems like a theme that has recurred in my life often since Aug. 9, 1995. Thinking of death in that way seems to take a certain amount of sting out of the finality of someone’s passing.
—Damon Thomas, host of the WSCA radio program “Dead Ahead

”My brother Tom and I have lived in the New England area our whole lives. At the ages of 37 and 38, we have been fans of the Dead since the late 1980s. I caught my first show in Frankfurt, Germany, in October 1990, while serving in the Army.

When I returned home, my brother and I always enjoyed going to lots of Grateful Dead shows. We didn’t actually go “on tour,” following the band across the country, but we made some weekend trips around New England. There are very few things that would bring a smile to our faces as much as seeing the Grateful Dead do their thing.

In the summer of 1995, I was painting with some friends of mine to make some money. I took the day off on Aug. 9 because I wasn’t feeling well. I was lying in bed with some GD background music on when I got a call from my brother, Tom. “Did you hear?” he asked. “Hear what?” I said. He was having a hard time even getting words out of his mouth. He then said, and I’ll never forget his words, “What’s the worst thing that could possibly happen?” I sat in silence for a second, and he followed up with “Jerry’s dead.” For a minute, neither of us said anything. The feeling was like one of our best friends had died. We remembered that Bobby was in Hampton and wondered how he must have been feeling. Tom told me he was going up there.

Just as I got off the phone, my boss and a friend stopped by my apartment. They handed me a six-pack of beer and told me they were sorry. Time to mourn. I spent the rest of the day listening to some extremely high volume Grateful Dead and doing my best to keep a smile on my face. I wasn’t able to make it to Hampton Beach that night with my brother. To be honest, I can’t even recall why, but it must have been a good reason. It turned out that Bobby put on a very gutsy performance that night. My life, along with countless others, certainly changed on that August day in 1995. 
—Michael Lazzaro, of Newburyport, Mass.

First of all, it is a day I will never forget.

I was living in New York City and was with my 13-month-old son. Jerry Garcia’s death was all over the news. My husband at the time (we are now divorced), came home early from work and we all went to Strawberry Fields in Central Park. A lot of Deadheads joined together at Strawberry Fields to sing Dead songs and hold candles. People looked very dazed and walked around with pictures of Jerry.

Fox 5 News was there and a reporter interviewed me. I talked about how much I listened to the Dead and told them that while my son Jon was in my belly he listened to the Dead too. The Fox 5 reporter talked about how Jon will know about Jerry and help his legend live on. The header on the TV when I was interviewed was: “Vicki Waldman, DEADHEAD MOM.”
—Vicki Engel, of Long Island, N.Y.

I fell in love with the Dead in the early 1990s. It took one show and I was hooked! I became a hand drummer and fire chain twirler to entertain the REALLY happy people, if ya know what I mean. It wasn’t for money! It was for the circus that the “LOT” becomes, the community, the family of likeminded people from all walks of life converging and rejoicing in harmony, hugging people you never met, smoking with people from across the country and meeting new musicians. For a short amount of time we were all one.

I live in the Chicago area and I saw Jerry’s last show on July 9, 1995 at Soldier Field. I was also at the show the night before and I could hardly walk after two days of Dead shows! I was getting ready for another festival when my father, JERRY, was diagnosed with brain cancer. He died a week to the day before JERRY GARCIA died!

I was devastated. And the worst part of the whole thing was that I couldn’t tell whose death I was more crushed by. My dad was my dad; I lived with him and our spirits were close. Jerry, on the other hand, was my heart, my lifestyle and my inspiration to make new music. He inspired me to be a decent person to my fellow man and not to destroy our earth. He showed the world that we were more than just stinky people following the Dead in a school bus.

I was at a festival when the news broke, and it all seemed surreal, like it was a nightmare I would wake up from. But it was true. I locked myself in the bus and listened to the Dead all night. I am a man, but I am also a person with feelings, so tears were shed. Then I got REALLY HAPPY, and just before dawn I emerged from the bus and howled at the moon. I grabbed my djembe, made a dash for the fire circle and drummed and danced harder than I ever have or ever will. Oh, and Jerry—either Garcia or my father—smiled upon me with the cutest belly dancer I have ever seen! Although the grieving shall never stop, as the music will never stop, I will never stop being part of my generation, and many generations to come.
—Kevin Morris, A.K.A. “DARKSTARR,” of Chicago, Ill.


Like most sophomores in high school, my friends and I were discovering lots of new music in 1995. Most of us were already familiar with the popular bands that our parents loved, like the Beatles, Bob Dylan, and the Rolling Stones. If our parents were exceptionally hip we might know of Rod Stewart or Led Zepplin. However, it was up to us to discover the hidden gems of Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, and Nirvana. And if we looked even further we might come upon the Grateful Dead, a band mostly unappreciated by radio stations, but deeply adored by the fan base that was familiar with their live shows.

In June of 1995, in the northern reaches of Vermont, we experienced one of the last concerts ever played by the Grateful Dead, and it garnered a great interest in me. Because of this, the day that Jerry Garcia died sticks out vividly in my mind. In mid-summer, I was working at Putnam’s Ski and Snowboard Shop in Portsmouth and we were listening to the radio. An occasional customer came in to buy a new pair of running shoes, try on some inline skates or perhaps have a tennis racket restrung. Throughout all of this, there were an unusual number of Grateful Dead songs playing on the radio. In fact, that was all that was on. Even at the naive age of 16, I knew something was up. We were soon informed that Jerry Garcia had passed away.

Quite amazingly, Bob Weir, Jerry Garcia’s band mate in the Grateful Dead, was playing in Hampton Beach that very night. A friend and I went down to hear or see what we could on that humid summer evening. Outside the Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom it was a different environment than what is usually found on a summer night among the lights, streaking cars, and greasy dudes on the strip. Candles, flowers and people paying their respects to the late Jerry Garcia packed the parking lots and sidewalks that surrounded the ballroom as the music of Bob Weir’s Rat Dog filtered out to the streets.
The distorted chords of “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” was the last song played, and we drifted off to walk along the beach. Jerry Garcia left behind a wealth of amazingly inventive music, and the best tribute we can give him is to let the music play.          
—Jesse Lewis, a native of Exeter, N.H.

I started going to Grateful Dead shows late in my life due to family needs prior to that, but I managed to see them play live from 1988 to 1995, averaging about 15 shows a year. When the news hit about Jerry, we all heard about it right away. People in certain locales called one another, not believing the written word. That evening, Deadheads from our area hiked Mt. Monadnock to grieve and later stopped at our house to share stories and be together. Over the next several weeks, people who were not really connected to the scene (like our mothers!) called to commiserate. They sent articles from wherever they were (San Francisco, London, etc.), including coverage in publications like Rolling Stone and People magazine. It never was the same again for me and, I suspect, for many of us. It truly was a momentous change to our lives when we stopped going on tour.                        
—Carol Roberts, of Wilton, N.H.

I remember it VERY clearly. I was working at a mental health clinic and I was the only Deadhead at the place. A colleague came into my office with the bad news: Jerry Garcia was dead. I managed a weak smile, thinking perhaps it was a joke. She said it was true, and I immediately cried, “What...How?” As she relayed the details, I found myself experiencing stages of grief. I first denied it. Then I became angry at the thought that this could have happened or that Jerry himself had not taken better care of his health. After all, we selfishly NEEDED him! Depression then set in. The rest of the workday was a blur. Everyone was calling me or leaving messages at my house. I kept those messages, but it is hard to this day to actually listen to them.

Some of us had previous plans to see Santana that night, and a friend urged me to still go and not mope or cry. I said, “Absolutely NOT,” and went straight to Central Park to mourn with the others who understood! There, I was comforted by hundreds of family. We cried, hugged, sang, and simply were. At times, we even laughed, thinking to ourselves, “Is it okay to be laughing?” But, although it was nervous laughter, we knew Jerry would want us to be merry. We updated each other on future plans as best as we could imagine. We thought, “No more Grateful Dead,” and questioned whether we wanted the band to continue without Jerry.

When the band finally announced it would not play without him, I was tremendously let down. It felt like the end. Eventually, the depression turned to reluctant acceptance. Still, we felt that unexplainable connection to Jerry’s spirit, the other members of the Dead, and each other. We somehow KNEW that whatever we did, be it going to side projects or the dream of some configuration of most or all of the members, it would get us through this life and make Jerry proud of us all for our love and perseverance!
—Lue Ann Librera, of Garfield, N.J.