The only definitive information on the formation of Silverbird comes from a 1971 newspaper article in the Daily Herald of Provo, Utah (one of the early Biloxi newspapers, The Daily Herald had that name also).  The article appears under the heading “Birth of a Navajo Rock Band” and has a dateline of Long Island University; actually, Navajo is not one of the Indian tribes mentioned by J. Reuben Silverbird in his biography. 

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This photograph of the Coronados with Jack Spector, a prominent New York City disc jockey on WMCA, was published in Billboard Magazine in 1965.  (Spector is notable for having been the first DJ in New York to play the Beatles’ initial Capitol Records single, “I Want to Hold Your Hand” in late December 1963).  Their music is described in the Daily Herald article mentioned previously in this way:  “The mode became eclectic – show tunes, popular numbers – with a professional gloss appropriate to the Borscht Belt and other resort circuits.” 

Meanwhile, the four teenaged children of the bandmembers in the Coronados – who sometimes appeared with their parents on stage – were being attracted to rock music and began singing and performing together as the Real Americans. 

(August 2013)