COACH, Thanks for the response! I will be responding to your response as soon as I get some free time. Hopefully this evening, but if yu knew Solo you must have definitely met Rob Johnson.
Rob and Solo were best friends and Rob joined Bill's gym with the intent of winning some national bodybuilding titles.
During his first meeting with Bill, Bil told him that he had some damn good potential but would have to drop his body fat percentage real low before going on any regimented program.
Rob eventually became close to Bill and his family and if I recall correctly he was dating Judy's (?) sister for a while.
One day aftert a decent workout Rob asked me to go with him while he got a haircut at some gym right on the edge of the LA Basin civilization because it was all desert directly across the highway all the way through the Mojave and beyond.
That's when I first met Rory who must have still been a teenage at that time. He was working in the gym and giving members a haircut for some extra income. Even then he has some great BB potential.
And many years later I met Joe Valdez (through Rory if I recall correctly) and we became good friends although I lived thousands of miles further west but we'd meet for lunch during one or more of the yearly Cal NPC events.
I don't know if Joe ever finished his book about the movie industry titled something like, "Why is Everyone in Hollywood Famous Except Me?!"
We talked about his book on many occasions but I don't think it ever got published.
If I recall correctly, Joe was one of the instrumental persons who got the NPC started and off the ground.
One again,those were the good old days! It actually made no matter in which gym you trained at.
My gym history is somewhat different than your's but still worth recalling due to the numerous gym-member murders, drug dealings, diamond heists, questionable disapperances and other unbelievable or questionable shit that would be worth writing a book about simply because 'my' gym had somewhat less than 200 members at the peak of its existence and more crime than can fit in a 747.
And those questionable 'gym experiences' included a few well known individuals who are often talked about on this Board.
A good percentage of those gym members were involved in some illicit shenanigan that the law often investigated but seldom persecuted.
But still ....them were the good old days not simply because of any particular gym .... but simply due to the fact that everything was totally different way back then and bodybuilding and everything related to the lifting of heavy things was relatively unknown and a complete mystery to the vast majority of every earth residing creature.
It was something like a very exclusive group of hard living individuals who had to have a 300 bench press or better to even gain acceptance.
Nuff said,..... Thanks Coach.