By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2024-11-23 16:58:32 | Updated at 2024-11-23 19:42:37
2 hours ago
Massachusetts restaurant owner, Alice Brock, who was immortalized by a popular Arlo Guthrie song, has died at the age of 83.
Brock died in a hospice on Thursday in Wellfleet from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, her caretaker Viki Merrick told The New York Times.
She was best known for Guthrie's 1967 antiwar song Alice's Restaurant, a Thanksgiving staple classic-rock production.
In the 18-minute song, Guthrie sings 'you can get anything you want' at Brock's restaurant and rambles a recounting of a visit to her restaurant the Back Room in Western Massachusetts for Thanksgiving dinner one year.
In the lyrics, Brock cooked a big meal for Guthrie and his friend Rick Robbins the day before they appeared in court for littering; Guthrie sings about how he and Robbins left trash in a ravine.
Brock, who bailed the men out, even helped the songwriter write the first half of the song.
Massachusetts restaurant owner, Alice Brock, who was immortalized by a popular Arlo Guthrie song, has died at the age of 83
'We were sitting around after dinner and wrote half the song,' she previously said.
After the song's release, the restaurant owner became a bit famous herself and people began to recognize her from it.
'I was very uncomfortable because public figures are not really treated with much respect,' she told WAMC Northeast Public Radio in 2014. 'Once your name is in the paper, people feel that they can go: "Oh, are you Alice? Turn around," like they want to see my behind or something.'
