Bill Mulstay and Mike Hughes

12/6/2023

Bill Mulstay is a former fireman, carney and an artist with more than 60 years of significant work in Des Moines. Mike Hughes is a guitar maker, post beam constructionist and greeting card (“Good for You”) creator. We asked them to lunch at Manhattan Deli. We went after 1 p.m. thinking it might be quiet by then, but we still had to scramble to snare the last open table. Not even seemingly endless street work and a strange decision by the city to reduce handicap accessible parking from seven spaces to two have kept people from their favorite sandwiches. 

We are three old, college-educated hippies. Today many kids like us are foregoing college as an unnecessary expense. Would you still go to college today? 

“The minute I got out of the University of Iowa, I saw no way my education was going to aid my livelihood, so I got a trade. I walked into NBN Guitars in Longmont, Colorado, and asked for a job. It was a great place. We made guitars for Stephen Stills. We made him a neck for his National steel guitar and a banjo, too. James Taylor and Leo Kotke were customers. And Paul Simon’s brother, I think his name was Eddie,” said Hughes. 

“I was a carney. Mom started the first lemonade stand at the Iowa State Fair, and we took that show on the road. Did most of the state fairs in the Midwest and Texas and nearly every small town in Iowa. I remember when there was only one day at the Texas Fair when Blacks were allowed in. I was also a fireman on the trains. I fed the fire that fueled the steam. All of a sudden, one day every railroad in the U.S. and Canada converted from steam engines, and the job was obsolete. The carny life was aging out, too — no more circuses. So I was 25 before I even thought about college. Then I went to Drake hoping to play basketball. 

“I only had room on my schedule for one or two electives, and art was one of them. I liked it. Drake was a magic place for artists in the 1960s. Jules Kirschenbaum was there. Gary Gildner and Ed Mayo were poets and writers then. I figured I could teach art, so I got a master’s in painting and printmaking,” said Mulstay. 

The Des Moines art scene is nothing like it was 60 years ago. How has it changed for you? 

“I have works in the art museums of Baylor and Missouri State. In those days, the best way to market your work was to enter competitions. If you won, you won a purchase award. That brought the old carney out in me. I towed a trailer of art to Waco and Springfield and other places. Today, Moberg Gallery represents people worldwide,” said Mulstay. 

Do you admire any younger local artists? 

“Yeah, Scott Charles Ross. He overlapped with me at Drake. He’s special,” said Mulstay.

Living as long as we have, lots of things have become obsolete, or just vanished. What do you miss?

“There were so many good Italian places around Francis Avenue. One was across the street from Veterans Hospital. Wagon Wheel or something like that. There was a great bar called the Rock Island Gun Club. They created great characters. Johnny Critelli was one. He had a place at Francis and what’s now called MLK. He was front-page news. One-armed bandits were the rumor. All his kids became lawyers and judges. 

“Dentists (Angelo) Biggie Gillotti and Tony Porto were bigger than life guys. There was a small place by the Onion Ring at Merle Hay and Hickman. It had no name or sign, but it was a legend. I was in the bar one time, and I see (Governor) Harold Hughes, F. Lee Bailey, Floren DiPaglia and Pete DePhillips sitting together. Pete owned the place. I worked there when I was at Drake. Now every place has a name but no mysticism,” said Mulstay.

“I missed most of the So’s Your Mother era because I was in Colorado, but that was a special place. The Birds played there. So did Mose Allison and Johnny Winter. Winter was just passing through when he jammed there,” added Hughes.

“Every time I went to Mother’s, I ended up either getting laid or thrown in jail,” added Mulstay.

“Even the cops were legendary back then. Tony Mihalovic was the most popular guy in town,” said Mulstay.

Sneaking into places was rife in the day. Now kids have thousands of bucks to spend on Taylor Swift concerts. I used to get into KRNT Theater via the basement from KRNT TV. Saw Kingston Trio, Hank Williams, Peter, Paul and Mary that way.

“I saw Verne Gagne there that way and closed-circuit fights. My best sneak-in was Drake Fieldhouse. You could sneak in the stadium just by hopping a fence and then enter the fieldhouse via the tunnel. It wasn’t just for basketball then; there were concerts there,” said Mulstay. 

“I remember a guy from Dowling, Joe Gomez. One day he came to school all dressed up in pointed toe shoes and a suit and tie. I asked him what the occasion was. ‘Al Capone’s birthday,’ he said. A few weeks later, he is all dressed up again. ‘My birthday’ was his explanation. A while later, I read about his death. He was shot by police while stealing a car,” said Hughes. 

“I miss the old days at the movies. We would sit in the balcony and make cocktails, and no one bothered us,” said Mulstay.

Mulstay still has a beard. Hughes used to. Did the appearance of hippieness cause hassles? 

“One time I was boarding a plane at Stapleton (airport). I used to wait till last call so I didn’t have to wait in long lines. So, I am boarding and two guys in tear drop sunglasses and blue suits stop me and start asking questions. I didn’t even have an ID because you didn’t need one then. I finally ask why I am being hassled, and one of them says ‘You fit the profile of a hijacker.’ That was right after DB Cooper.

“Another time I was thrown in jail in Nogales, on the American side. I wouldn’t eat powdered eggs, so this guy asks if he can have mine. I say sure and ask him what he was in for. ‘Horse thieving.’ I was in jail with the last American horse thief. But you can’t hang a man for killing a woman who’s trying to steal his horse,” said Hughes. ♦