“Walk Right!” Revisted

The New York Post is just catching up… In December of 1984, Joseph Virgil Skaggs (a.k.a. Joey Skaggs) formed WALK RIGHT! “” an ad hoc group of vigilante sidewalk etiquette enforcers who patrolled the streets to make New York a better place to live and walk. Dressed in all black with WALK RIGHT! sweat shirts they enforced a list of sixty six rules for pedestrians they wanted enacted into law.


Tourists, we”re begging you: Please learn how to walk in NYC
By Barbara Hoffman
New York Post
December 22, 2017

Welcome to Gridlock Central, otherwise known as New York City during the holidays. It helps to remember that you”re not in Kansas anymore “” or Manitoba, for that matter. Life will be so much better for yourself and everyone around you if you observe a few basic rules.
In other words, walk this way:

Keep right.
If you”re walking more slowly than the natives “” and there”s a good reason for the phrase “a New York minute” “” stay to the right on stairs, escalators and sidewalks, so we can step nimbly by you.

Separate.
Two-by-two worked for Noah”s Ark, but not Midtown. If you must hold hands, prepare to break away when we come barreling toward you, desperate to flag that cab. Walking four abreast as a family? Fuhgeddaboutit. Pair off and stay close.

Don”t stop short.
Unless, of course, you”re about to be run over. But certainly step aside and out of traffic”s way to admire that tall building, marvel at a panhandler or snap a selfie. Speaking of which:

Don”t text in revolving doors.
Even seasoned New Yorkers can”t juggle that. You can wait 30 seconds before tweeting, “Guess where I am?”

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Verne “Bulldog” Williams (1935-2010), RIP

From publisher and editor Joey Skaggs:


It is with shock and sadness that I write of the unexpected passing of Verne Williams, a life-long friend and co-conspirator, on Thursday, October 14. Among other illustrious facets of his career, Verne was with me on my Hippie Bus Tour to Queens in 1968, was the inspiration for and center piece of my Bad Guys Talent Management Agency in 1984; and performed in Walk Right! (1984), The Fat Squad (1986), and Save The Geoduck (1987). He appeared as me for an interview with Playback Magazine (1995). He was a great, endearing and enduring friend.

A memorial service will be held October 30 at 1pm at Marinella Restaurant, on the corner of Carmine and Bedford Streets in Greenwich Village, NYC.

Here’s a walk down my memory lane with Verne:


Hippie Bus Tour to Queens, 1968

In 1968, I loaded a Greyhound bus with camera-toting, long haired, beaded hippies and took them on a bus tour of surburban Queens. I did this in response to all the suburbanites who were coming into the East Village to gawk at the hippies. I called it my “cultural exchange” program. Verne was one of the passengers.




Bad Guys Talent Management Agency, 1984

Verne left NYC for greener pastures, literally. He ran a hog farm in Vermont for a while and then moved to Virginia where he was trimming the hooves of cattle for a living. He really wanted to be an actor. He wrote me letter after letter imploring me to help him get some national commercials while he awaited the brass ring, which to him was a role in a feature film. I tried to talk some sense into him, but he would have none of that. Since he didn’t have any acting training, experience, or representation, I decided to create a talent management agency specifically for him. I called it Bad Guys Incorporated. I would represent bad guys, bad girls, bad kids and bad dogs — venomous vixens, burly bouncers and slimy sleazes. I told Verne to go to the Post Office and bring back a wanted poster so I could create his head shot.
Continue reading “Verne “Bulldog” Williams (1935-2010), RIP”

Improv Everywhere: The Tourist Lane

This project is derivative of Banksy’s Fat Lane, which created a walking lane for obese people, which was itself derivative of Joey Skaggs’ 1984 Walk Right! project, in which a group of street vigilantes enforced 66 rules of street etiquette for New Yorkers, but New Yorkers apparently still don’t know how to walk right…


From Charlie Todd of Improv Everywhere:

The Tourist Lane

For our latest mission, we created separate walking lanes for tourists and New Yorkers on a Fifth Avenue sidewalk. Department of Transportation “employees” were on hand to enforce the new rules and ask pedestrians for their feedback on the initiative.

For video and more photos, visit Improv Everywhere.

Idea by: Jeff Greenspan
Shot by: Matt Adams, Jason Eppink, and Keith Haskel
Photography: Katie Sokoler and Scott Beale
DOT Workers: Dan Black, Don Fanelli, Jeff Greenspan, Cody Lindquist