Waterdog passed away August 9, 2006. He told me how he got his name was that he was originally from Waterbury, Connecticut, and so they started to call him "Waterdog." He's definitely one of America's original road warriors.
I remember meeting him years ago in Rockville, MD, back in the mid '80s. He told me that he was en route to Chicago at that time, hoping to get a role as a stand-in pool player in "The Color of Money," which paid a whopping 65 bucks a day.
Keith said Waterdog used to live with a friend of his named Don Percy (sp) in California. When Waterdog and Keith were both 16 and 17 years old, they used to play against each other, shooting pool, and he said Waterdog and him were about even at that time. This would have been 1972 or 1973 time period. That was the era when Waterdog and Steve Gumphreys were running around together.
Waterdog used to be heralded as a straight pool champion, running hundreds at the snap of the fingers.
Sadly, Waterdog suffered from substance abuse, like many, many people during the Woodstock era when it happened to be a societal norm to alter one's state of consciouesness at will. Many people got high back then on a variety of substances, from marijuana, hash, mushrooms, PCP, LSD, all the way to cocaine and heroin.
Rumor has it that Don suffered from a leg injury when he was being chased by the cops during a drug bust. He had just paid off his drug dealer the money he owed him, so he could get some more drugs, and right at this time, the cops busted the joint. The drug dealer dropped the money and drugs. Don picked up his dough and ran with it. Cop chased him down and stepped on his ankle, resulting in permanent injury for the rest of his life.
Though Don was an addict, he had a reputation of being a kind, unassuming-type person. He didn't have a mean bone in his body. I remember him as being very sweet and soft spoken. RIP, Waterdog.