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"When I pulled it back up, I noticed that his hand was stiff and cold." Carr was exhausted and, according to the police reports, nervous enough to invite suspicion that foul play had been involved in Williams' death. They moved to a new house on the other side of town on Rose Street, which Williams' mother soon turned into another boarding house. Ultimately, the completion of the album included recordings by Alan Jackson, Norah Jones, Jack White, Lucinda Williams, Vince Gill, Rodney Crowell, Patty Loveless, Levon Helm, Jakob Dylan, Sheryl Crow, and Merle Haggard. [31], The president of MGM told Billboard magazine that the company got only about five requests for pictures of Williams during the weeks prior to his death, but over 300 afterwards. While living in Georgiana, Williams met Rufus "Tee-Tot" Payne, a street performer. Williams' personal life took a major turn in 1943 when he met Audrey Mae Sheppard, who was the mother of a young daughter and had only recently left a messy marriage. Williams was among the first class of artists inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1961, and in 2010, the Pulitzer Board awarded him a special citation for songwriting. [38] The band traveled throughout central and southern Alabama performing in clubs and at private gatherings. On the evening of December 30, 1952, the restless, rail-thin 29-year-old tossed and turned in bed at his home in Montgomery, Ala. Meanwhile, Lewis Fitzgerald's son Ricky billed himself as Hank Williams IV following his father's claim of being Williams' son. Fearful that disc jockeys and jukebox operators would hesitate to accept these unusual recordings, Williams used this alias to avoid hurting the marketability of his name. Having interviewed Carr, the best that Peter Cooper of The Tennessean could offer was that "somewhere between Mount Hope and Oak Hill", Carr noticed Williams' blanket had fallen off. Despite his relatively brief career, he is one of the most celebrated and influential musicians of the 20th century, especially in country music. Lyons recalled how Hank rose from being a shoeshine boy to star of the stage. The recordings were found by collector George Gimarc at radio station KSIB in Creston, Iowa. Williams had also married Sheppard before her divorce was final, on the 10th day of a required 60-day reconciliation period. Williams told a story in later concerts that attributed his name change to a cat's yowling. At cafes across the South, the paper added, his songs blared over radios as news of his death spread. Marshall had been previously convicted for forgery, and had been paroled and released from the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in 1951. Country music legends June Carter and Bill Monroe were among those who filed past his open casket as Hanks band, The Drifting Cowboys, backed up those singing tributes to the fallen star. That day, Williams could not fly because of an ice storm in the Nashville area; he hired a college student, Charles Carr, to drive him to the concerts. [39] Oklahoma Governor Johnston Murray revoked the parole of Horace Raphol "Toby" Marshall, who returned to prison to complete his forgery sentence.[40]. He returned to perform in KWKH and WBAM shows and in the Louisiana Hayride, for which he toured again. A year later he was entering talent shows and had his own band, Hank Williams and his Drifting Cowboys. [131] In 1993, a double-disc set of recordings of Williams for the Health & Happiness Show was released. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. The set was re-released on Hank Williams: The Legend Begins in 2011. [137], Williams was portrayed by English actor Tom Hiddleston in the 2016 biopic I Saw the Light, based on Colin Escott's 1994 book Hank Williams: The Biography. [47] As a result of the new variety of his repertoire, Williams published his first songbook, Original Songs of Hank Williams. Sheppard, it seems, was extremely eager to make a mark in show business and, despite her obviously limited talent, pushed her husband to let her sing. While her son was not on the stage, his song I Saw The Light opened the show. After Hawkshaw Hawkins and other performers started singing Williams' song "I Saw the Light" as a tribute to him, the crowd realized that he was indeed dead and began to sing along. [16] The couple divorced on May 29, 1952. [31], In July 1937, the Williams and McNeils opened a boarding house on South Perry Street in downtown Montgomery. The Garden Spot Programs, 1950, a series of publicity segments for plant nursery Naughton Farms originally aired in 1950. He died in the back seat of his Cadillac while being driven to a gig on New Year's Day 1953. Picking up the guitar for the first time at the age of eight, Williams was just 13 when he made his radio debut. Here are more vintage images and stories of Alabamas past. He had 2 stepmothers and a mother. Died On: 1953: How old was Hank Williams Sr.? The first celebration, in 1954, featured the unveiling of a monument at the Cramton Bowl that was later placed at the gravesite of Williams. Williams and his wife approached Fred Rose, the president of the company, during one of his habitual ping-pong games at WSM radio studios. "I saw that the overcoat and blanket that had been covering Hank had slipped off," Carr told yet another reporter. His breakthrough moment came in 1949 with the release of Lovesick Blues, an old show tune that Williams parlayed into a chart-topping hit, an invitation to join the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, and international fame. His passing did not bring about the end to his stardom, however. What we do know is that Williams died when he was just 29 years old. He died in 1939, but his musical legacy would live on in Williams. Payne gave Williams guitar lessons in exchange for money or meals prepared by Lillie. [58] He brought together Bob McNett (guitar), Hillous Butrum (bass), Jerry Rivers (fiddle) and Don Helms (steel guitar) to form the most famous version of the Drifting Cowboys, earning an estimated $1,000 per show (equivalent to $11,400 in 2021) That year Audrey Williams gave birth to Randall Hank Williams (Hank Williams Jr.). He purchased the DSC title for $35 from the "Chicago School of Applied Science"; in the diploma, he requested that the DSc was spelled out as "Doctor of Science and Psychology". [46], In 1945, when he was back in Montgomery, Williams started to perform again for the WSFA radio station. [101] Released in July, "I Won't Be Home No More" went to No. He returned to Shreveport, Louisiana, to perform on KWKH and WBAM shows and in the Louisiana Hayride, for which he toured again. [74], In June 1952, he recorded "Jambalaya (On the Bayou)", "Window Shopping", "Settin' the Woods on Fire", and "I'll Never Get out of this World Alive". As the titles of some of Williams' songs suggest, heartbreak and turmoil were never that far from his life. On the weekend after the tour ended, Williams was photographed backstage at the Grand Ole Opry signing a motion picture deal with MGM. [16] Williams' father was frequently relocated by the lumber company railway for which he worked, and the family lived in many southern Alabama towns. The song resonated with music fans, as well as executives at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, who invited Williams to perform. . The fall reactivated his old back pains. He showed up unannounced at the family's home in Montgomery. [11] Carr later drove on until he stopped for fuel at a gas station in Oak Hill, West Virginia, where he discovered Williams seemingly asleep in the back seat. [37], In August 1938, Elonzo Williams was temporarily released from the hospital. Hank Williams, byname of Hiram Williams, also called the Hillbilly Shakespeare, (born September 17, 1923, Georgiana, Alabama, U.S.died January 1, 1953, Oak Hill, West Virginia), American singer, songwriter, and guitarist who in the 1950s arguably became country music 's first superstar. Jeff Wallenfeldt, manager of Geography and History, has worked as an editor at Encyclopaedia Britannica since 1992. She was a headstrong, recently divorced mother of a 2-year-old, six months his senior and also a musician. The break had to come, he added. The song, backed by "Kaw-Liga", was No. His funeral took place on January 4 at the Montgomery Auditorium,[23] with his coffin placed on the flower-covered stage. [40] Williams' alcohol use started to become a problem during the tours; on occasion he spent a large part of the show revenues on alcohol. The material was restored and remastered by Michael Graves and released by Omnivore Recordings. [114] Many artists of the 1950s and 1960s, including Elvis Presley,[115] Bob Dylan, Tammy Wynette, David Houston, Jerry Lee Lewis, Merle Haggard,[116] Gene Vincent,[117] Carl Perkins,[118] Ricky Nelson, and Conway Twitty[119] recorded Williams' songs during their careers. I was a pretty good imitator of Roy Acuff, but then I found out they already had a Roy Acuff, so I started singin' like myself. Carr talked to Williams for the last time when they stopped at a restaurant in Bristol, Virginia. The important thing is that he made millions of people happy, an editorial in The Advertiser stated on Jan. 3, 1953. He attributed the decision to Williams' declining career: "Most of his bookings were of the honky-tonk beer joint variety that he simply hated. [39] The band started playing in theaters before the start of the movies and later in honky-tonks. His stardom put money in his pocket and gave him the kind of creative freedom artists long for. Hank Williams was born in September 1923 in a small Alabama farming community about 70 miles south of Montgomery. "Tom [Hiddleston, the actor portraying Williams] puts across that impending sense of doom. [135][136] The release won a Grammy Award for Best Historical Album. Omissions? After recording "Never Again" and "Honky Tonkin'" with Sterling Records, he signed a contract with MGM Records. A. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. [103][104] Alabama governor Gordon Persons officially proclaimed September 21 "Hank Williams Day". They hit it off, and Williams asked Sheppard to marry him almost immediately. By the end of 1952, Williams had started to have heart problems. Williams had married his second wife, Billie Jean Jones in October 1952, as 14,000 people looked on in Louisiana where Williams hosted radio shows after being fired from the Grand Ole Opry in August of that year. Carr immediately realized that he was dead and informed the filling station's owner, Glenn Burdette, who called the chief of the local police, O.H.