A steady, focused performance at Manor Downs in August 1985, in which the band encored with a stunning Garcia-sung version of Dylan's "She Belongs to Me" swelling into a rave-up of "One More Saturday Night" (it was actually a Saturday), turned out to be the Dead's final local jam.

Woody Roberts: The Dead didn't really like to play Texas. It was so spread out here. They made their money up and down the East and West Coasts. They stopped coming to Austin because the Downs stopped having music in 1986. It shut down and reopened as a pari-mutuel [off-track gambling].

Manor Downs had been a soft place to land for the Dead, but without that friendly connection, Austin got crossed off their list. In 2009, Dead co-founder Bill Kreutzmann joined forces with then-local guitarist Malcolm "Papa Mali" Welbourne, Reed Mathis of Tea Leaf Green on bass, and Austin pianist/trombonist Matt Hubbard in the funky voodoo rock outfit 7 Walkers (revisit "Swampadelic," Nov. 26, 2010).

Matt Hubbard: Bill said, "Hey, Robert Hunter has some lyrics." He's of course the lyricist for the Grateful Dead. And one of the songs was called "7 Walkers." We were sitting around and Bill says, "Let's call the band 7 Walkers." We recorded the album in Austin at a studio called the Nest. We did a solid week with a 24-track, two-inch tape machine. Some days we recorded for 12 straight hours, just jamming. We'd already demoed some of the songs at Willie Nelson's place in Luck. One of the songs, "King Cotton Blues," I got Willie to perform on.

When you play with Bill, anything is possible. He likes to say that every beat is the one. Whenever he plays, it makes people dance. As the Dead's drummer, he drove a lot of their long jams, and he's played for more people live than any drummer in the history of the world, which is mind blowing. He's a very happy drummer and music is sacred to him.

What about the skydiving stunt gone wrong?

Margaret Moser: Skydivers? I vaguely recall.

Woody Roberts: I don't remember exactly what happened. There was supposed to be skydivers and it seems like something went wrong with one of the dives, but I can't recall.

Turk Pipkin: I heard that story for years. I'm not sure now if I remember it happening, or if I've heard the story so many times that I think I do.

Henry Gonzalez: They'd already opened the gates, so people were in there. They put a big cross in front of the stage and here comes the plane. One of the divers didn't show up because he was sick, so they threw out a dummy in a skydiver suit. And then the other two guys jumped out. They parachuted out, but the dummy went straight down, right to the cross. I was a bouncer that night and I remember seeing that guy falling and everyone going, "Ahhhhhhhhhh!"

They freaked out! I mean, how many people do you think were under the influence?