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Two videos recently posted to YouTube are perfect complements to the stories in the “Detroit Country Music” book.
Born in 1921, Cliff Gilbert started playing music on a fiddle at age three. Gilbert eventually mastered the guitar, and wound up inventing quite a few elements and variations of the instrument. Based in Flint, but well-acquainted with Detroit and its country musicians and nightclubs, Gilbert played all over the United States during his career. During the late 1950s and early 1960s, he spent six years demonstrating guitars and crafting components for Fender in California, before returning to Michigan. I recommend watching each video in its entirety. Thanks to veteran musician Lafayette Yarbrough for the tip!
I met Gilbert in 1995. He was playing guitar at a party for Fran Mitchell with Eddie Jackson, Swanee Caldwell, and Marv Weyer. Bob Lowe, who produces a fine show called “Bob’s Music Time,” posted an interview with Gilbert in January 2014. Many thanks to Bob for featuring the “Detroit Country Music” book in this episode. The program includes some inspiring vintage video, courtesy Gilbert’s personal library, including a performance with Eddie Jackson and Swanee Caldwell at about 35 minutes, from the early 1990s.
The Fraternal Order of Eagles in Burton, Michigan, set Gilbert on a stage and turned loose an affectionate crowd in another fascinating video posted this month (April 2014). Congratulations to Cliff Gilbert, a true guitar hero and first-class fellow.
Following the publication of “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies” at the end of 2013, last year was filled with truly golden times. From musical parties at Club Canton and United Sound Systems, to presenting at the International Country Music Conference in Nashville, Tennessee; from hosting programs at the Detroit Historical Museum and local public libraries to appearances at the Henry Ford; from nice reviews in the Detroit News, Metro Times, Hour Detroit, Bluegrass Unlimited, and Vintage Guitar to radio interviews and an appearance on Channel 4 TV, the reception of the book exceeded our expectations.
Thanks to everyone – and we mean EVERYONE – who wrote, called, met us, and paid any kind of attention to this project.
Visit the Press page for links and details on media coverage.
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We were sad to hear Jimmy Dickens passed away Jan. 2, at the age of 94.
The man’s charisma, heart, and expression combined into a giant personality who everyone loved. When Keith Cady called Mr. Dickens to follow up a short interview he granted backstage at the “Grand Ole Opry” more than a dozen years ago, Dickens was out mowing his lawn. Mr. Dickens climbed off his tractor just to speak with Keith for as long as he pleased, contributing stories about Casey Clark, Buddy Emmons, and Okie Jones, and talking about his gigs with the Mel Steele band, and WKNX radio in Saginaw.
Our sympathies go out to his family, friends, and fans.
Seventy-five years ago, two young men from Kentucky cut a juke box record for a Detroit vending company. Its surprising success sparked a country music recording industry in Detroit, only interrupted by the men’s departure at the height of World War II.
During the early 1930s, George and Leslie York sang and played guitars together in a group with two more of their brothers and an older sister for church and social events around their home town of Louisa, Kentucky. The York Brothers first entertained as a duo at WPAY radio Portsmouth, Ohio, around 1936. By 1938 they had moved to Detroit to work in its factories. Leslie had developed a songwriting habit that wouldn’t quit, and “… between cars on the assembly line, Leslie wrote his impressions of the Polish section of Hamtramck, Michigan, and called it ‘Hamtramck Mama’.” [1]
She’s truckin’ in the daytime, shimmy’n at night
She’s a Hamtramck Mama and she shakes it right
The York Brothers cut the song for their very first record [2] at Universal Recording Studios, located on East Jefferson Avenue, for the Detroit-based Marquette Music Company, which distributed records in juke boxes across Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio. Soon after its release, Leslie York was let go from his job. He returned to Ohio, where he played WPAY radio and local taverns with Portsmouth musician Virg Frazie. [3]
Two months later [Leslie] turned on the radio to [NBC Network broadcaster] Lowell Thomas’ program and heard how the district attorney in Detroit had banned “Hamtramck Mama” from the city’s juke boxes because he considered it defamatory to Hamtramck. [Leslie] was scared to go back until George sent for him to play some of the biggest night spots in Detroit. The publicity had “made” the record. [4]
“Hamtramck Mama” reportedly sold 300,000 copies in Detroit, appearing on three different local record labels: Universal (at least two different pressings), Hot Wax, and Mellow. The York Brothers’ popularity led to lucrative bookings (mainly in Detroit, due to wartime travel restrictions) and more recordings issued by Detroit juke box vendors. In 1941 they signed a contract with major label Decca, which issued three records. After “Hamtramck Mama” hit, a few other C&W groups in Detroit made records for the Universal and Mellow labels, but the Yorks supplied Mellow Records with scores of titles (most penned by Leslie) before they joined the U.S. Navy in March 1944. [5]
After their return to civilian life, the York Brothers moved to WSM radio in Nashville, Tennessee, and re-made “Hamtramck Mama” in 1947 for Bullet Records. When they moved back to Detroit in 1949, Fortune Records re-issued the original 1939 recording, which again proved popular among Detroiters, and stayed in print for a few more decades.
Listen to: The York Brothers – Hamtramck Mama (1939)
As we toast the 75th anniversary of “Hamtramck Mama,” don’t forget to check out the survey of the York Brothers’ entire musical career in “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.” Cheers!
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Notes
- Source: Unidentified 1947 news clipping from scrapbook of country music historian John Bell.
- The York Brothers cut “Going Home” for the flip side of the record.
- Correspondence between Craig Maki and John Bell, 2014.
- Bell’s 1947 news clipping (see note 1).
- When he enlisted, Leslie York’s weekly pay as an entertainer at Detroit’s Jefferson Inn nightclub was $115. At the time, servicemen earned about one-third that amount per month.
Fans of longtime Detroit resident and country music bandleader Forest Rye are smiling at the thought of recordings they hadn’t heard before.
A record I’d never seen on the short-lived Alben label turned up recently. Detroit juke box and vending machine operator Ben Okum and his business partner Al Smith created the Alben Records Company in 1948. Okum issued the first version of Jimmy Work’s “Tennessee Border” on Alben 501 late that year (see “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies” for Work’s story). Alben pressed a couple of other records, with red and silver labels, for the Rhythm and Blues market, but the label of the record in question had the blue and silver color scheme of Work’s record, and a catalog number of 601.
The artist’s name, Uncle Ruye, caught my eye because it appeared to be an alternative spelling of “Rye” – and Forest Rye was known to record under another name, Conrad Brooks, for records on Universal, Hot Wax, and Mellow. Furthermore, one side was titled “Crying My Eyes Out,” a song that Mercury Records issued in 1951 by Rye.
I Smiled At Her – Uncle Ruye and his Sage Hollow Boys
Crying My Eyes Out – Uncle Ruye and his Sage Hollow Boys
“The ‘I Smiled At Her (She Smiled At Me)’ song was sung to me by my cousin Katherine … She remembered it from when she was a young girl,” she said. [1]
Probably recorded in 1949, the Alben disc may have been an audition of sorts for Rye. Ben Okum developed ties with Mercury Records around that time, and Rye recorded a new version of “Crying My Eyes Out” along with three other originals for the Chicago-based label around 1950-51. [2]
Click here to read my original account of Forest Rye in Detroit.
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Notes
- Linda (Rye) Austin interviewed March 3, 2014
- “Crying My Eyes Out” b/w “After All These Years” Mercury 6328; “Midnight Boogie Blues” b/w “Won’t You Give Me A Little Loving” Mercury 6329
- Source: Advertisement for Boy Scouts benefit show at Saline High School in Saline, Michigan. Saline Observer. (Thursday, April 24, 1947. Vol. 64, No. 29) 2.
This post is inspired by a recent meeting with the late guitarist Happy Moore’s family. Moore earned mentions in the book, as well as in this website (see the Jimmy Franklin story). Many thanks to Robert, Candace and Liz for getting in touch and sharing the story.
Percussive guitar
Before the late 1950s, the managers of the WSM Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee, did not allow the use of drums in its broadcasts. Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys ignored this rule in 1944 when they made their only appearance on the show. Until rock’n’roll changed the musical environment, the use of drums in country acts across North America was a novelty, and more common in western swing bands. (In Detroit, Casey Clark was the first country bandleader to hire a drummer, in 1952.)
So what did bands do for rhythm? Bass players hit their strings on the beat. When a rhythm guitarist came into the mix, emphasizing the same beat as the bass player, this usually filled out the sound. A great rhythm guitar player, perhaps someone influenced by jazz music such as Happy Moore, could make a guitar sound like a snare drum.
Modern Mustangs
Born in 1920, Emerson “Happy” Moore inherited his nickname from his dad, and grew up near Dayton, Ohio. By age twelve, he played rhythm guitar and sang at public shows in pop bands. It wasn’t until he met lead guitarist and singer Chuck Oakes in Dayton, when Moore began his association with country music. Moore, Oakes, Jimmy Franklin, and his brother Whitey participated in the Dayton music scene during and after World War II, working nightclubs with their own quartet, as well as with bassist Jimmie Saul and his Prairie Drifters, and guitarist Roy Lanham and the Whippoorwills.
By the late 1940s, Moore and the gang were working restaurants and clubs in Detroit as the Modern Mustangs, playing and singing cowboy music, western swing, and boogie woogie. “My dad didn’t drink,” said daughter Candace. “He just loved to play music. And when he played, his face would light up, just beam with joy. His guitar playing added so much, just filled out any group’s sound.” [1]
Moore music
Happy Moore worked in Detroit, Bay City, and traveled the region as a full-time musician with Chuck Oakes, singer Danny Richards, the Franklin Brothers, and guitarist Chuck Carroll. In 1954, Moore took a day job with the Burroughs company. He continued to gig on weekends for the rest of his life.
Listen to: Tumbling Tumbleweeds – WXYZ Motor City Jamboree
Aside from Chuck Oakes’ “Hey! It’s Chuck’s Boogie” issued by Fortune Records [2], on which Moore might have played rhythm guitar, the only recording we have of Moore is with a vocal trio that included Danny Richards and Whitey Franklin doing the Sons of the Pioneers’ “Tumbling Tumbleweeds” on the WXYZ Motor City Jamboree, ca. 1954. [3]
“He was asked to move to Nashville by several people,” said his wife Liz. “Jim Reeves, Moon Mullican … but he decided to stay put.” Reeves and Mullican both entertained at Detroit’s Roosevelt Lounge (on Mack near Montcalm), where Danny Richards’ band, which included Happy Moore, played host during the early 1950s.
Moore passed away from a heart attack in April 1984. “He was on his way to a gig on the night he died,” said his son Robert.
“You couldn’t keep him away from playing music,” said wife Liz. “He was complaining about the way he felt all day, and I said, ‘Why don’t you stay home tonight?’ ‘But the guys need me,’ he said. He just loved to play music with his friends. Any time, any place.”
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Notes
- Elizabeth, Robert, and Candace Moore interviewed Feb. 9, 2014.
- Around 1950, Fortune Records issued “Hey! It’s Chuck’s Boogie” backed with “Waltz Of Virginia” (Fortune 711).
- A home tape recording of this show features host Milton Estes, Danny Richards and his Gold Star Cowboys, singer Mary Ann Johnson, guest singers Flash Griner and Dixie Lee Walker, and headliner George Morgan with steel guitarist Don Davis in tow.
Harold Thomason Harry Thomas Odom was born in Paris, Tennessee, November 8, 1923. A gifted guitarist, his take off (or lead) playing on records was comparable to the best western swing pickers on recordings. He learned his licks from local jazz guitarist Bob Mitchell, playing jazz standards and country throughout his career. Although he played guitar in Detroit for more than three decades (1940s through 1970s), younger generations recognized Odom for his vocal on a risqué novelty called “She Won’t Turn Over For Me,” which first appeared as a jukebox single on Fortune Records subsidiary Renown, performed by Floyd Compton’s Western Troubadours in 1951 (see discography next week). The lyrics of the song described either a disagreeable automobile or woman. The track was included on Fortune’s “The Original Skeets McDonald’s Tattooed Lady And Others” album (circa 1960). In 2001, when this interview was done at his apartment in Detroit, Odom had suffered a stroke and no longer played guitar. He died September 18, 2010. The following features excerpts from a lengthier conversation. [1]
[Recording begins as Tommy Odom recalls working with Detroit bandleader Jack Luker at the West Fort Tavern, during the late 1940s.]
… Jack Luker, he played there, played rhythm. I played with so many different guys. I remember one night … I sat down on a stool – back then they didn’t make me stand up and I could play better sittin’ down – I pulled my hat down [over his eyes] and I’d been off for about two or three days. I thought, well, I’ll just rest my eyes for a couple of minutes, you know, and I fell forward on the dance floor, right on my head. [laughs] But Jackie … said, “What the hell’s the matter with you? You drunk? I’ll fire you!” Boy, he was mad. I took the rest of the night off. The next day he come over and said, “I need somebody to play the guitar. Are you gonna be sober tonight?” [laughs] …
How did you get interested in music?
My dad played banjo and fiddle. They tried to get him to play in Nashville, but he wouldn’t go. We had a big farm there. He come to Detroit, came up here to work. Then my mother moved up, and she brought me. I remember when she brang me up here. I lived over off of Jefferson, off some street. I went to Ammon [sp?] school, went to Gillis School, and then they found out – this was during the Depression, 1933 – they found out my dad had a hundred-and-sixty-acre farm in Tennessee, so they cut us off and give us forty dollars to go down to Tennessee.
He bought a Jersey cow for us kids. That was me, Johnny B., and Lewis, and Joe, and Jerry – no there wasn’t no Jerry then. He wasn’t born ’til ’41. … I cut timber with a cross saw down there ’til I got big enough and went to CCC [Civilian Conservation Corps] camp. That’s when I was seventeen. Then my uncle, he told me I could get a job at White Castle® [hamburgers, in Detroit].
Where was the CCC camp?
Cookeville, Tennessee. … There’s another guy from Cookeville, he used to play on Eight Mile. Boy, he was a good guitar player. I can’t remember his name, and he played there before I met [jazz guitarist] Bob Mitchell. Boy, he really could play the guitar. Now, Eddie Jackson, when he got out of the navy [1947], I was playing at the West Fort Tavern when he come in. …
Who were some of your influences growing up, for playing guitar?
My uncle, he played. Both my uncles. Shelley, he gave it up. But Prince, he played in Detroit. He played steel guitar in the clubs. He could play take off, but he couldn’t play it like me. And the Delmore Brothers, they played in Nashville. … There was another guy in Nashville, and boy he had some licks. I used to try to copy them. But then when I got to Cookeville, I kept playing. And Chet Atkins was playing in Knoxville. …
I used to know a lot of musicians, but after I had that stroke, if you don’t mention their name, I can’t remember them. [Odom points to photo on his wall.] Like that girl, I can’t remember her name. I remember her brother’s name. They called him “Tarzan.” Ken Maynard, that cowboy in the movies, was their uncle. [2] I was living in East Detroit, and Tarzan come up here. He was wantin’ me to go to East Detroit ’cause she wanted to see me. But I wouldn’t go. I didn’t want to get married to nobody then. I’d get a gal for thirty days. … It was the law then, if you lived with someone for thirty days, you married her. But they changed that law. I’d move on out, then I’d move back in. [laughs] I know that woman mighta wanted to get married. … I liked her a lot. …
Listen to: Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mtn Boys, feat. Tommy Odom – Dirty Boogie
I don’t have a picture of my grandmother. I didn’t like her anyway. And she didn’t like me. I liked my other grandma, ’cause … she’d give me anything – pies, cakes, just anything. And my other grandma, she’d serve meals to all the men first, and the kids would have to sit in the corner and wait. And all that was left for the kids was just bones. So I wouldn’t go up there. One day, they was up there, and my dad said to my mom, “Where are Thomason?” and she said, “He got off miles ago.” They lived off, down four miles of roads. She said, “When we got to Mammy’s he jumped off [the wagon] and went there. He ain’t going to eat like hogs and pigs.” [laughs]
I was up there one time, and my dad and grandpa were in the big barn down there. They had hay in there. My grandpa, my dad, and some uncles of mine were hittin’ that jug. Me and some cousins of mine were peepin’ through the logs and we saw them hit the jug and put it back in there, cover it up with hay. So they went back up the hill to the house, and we went in there and we hit the jug. I guess I was about ten years old, then. [laughs] It hit, too, boy. That moonshine … I know, I helped my dad make it down there. It starts off real strong at 160 proof, and he cut it down to a hundred. But people down there didn’t know what they was gettin’. You’d get it and five minutes later my throat was raw.
When did you come to Michigan, after the [CCC] camp?
When I come to Detroit, I started at Fort and Green. That’s where the White Castle was. [3] Then I went to Avery and Holden. Then I went to between Eight and Nine Mile on Woodward – that one’s still there. Then I went to that one, when they built it on Eight Mile and Gratiot. When they opened it up, the manager come over and let me go there. I remember there was Travis Goodwin, he was from Mississippi; Charlie something, he was from Alabama; one guy from Texas. …
Who were some of the musicians you first started playing with when you came up here? About what year was it when you came up here from Cookeville?
I was seventeen, then [1941]. I went to the Hollywood [Inn] and the West Fort [Tavern], sat in and played with them. I had an ID and you didn’t have a picture on them. The police come into the West Fort one time and said, “How old are you?” I pulled [the ID card] out and showed it to them. I said, “By God, I’m 21.” “Oh.” The Police bought me a drink. [laughs] … I come to Detroit in the summer time, and my birthday was in November. …
Before I went into the army, there was modern [swing] bands in the Hollywood [Inn], you know. There was modern bands at the West Fort, too. All the country bands – even Bob Mitchell – they was all playin’ on Eight Mile, but it was all modern music. They’d play some country songs. …
I was nineteen when I went into the army. I stayed out for a year. I’d go to Tennessee. I’d send a letter down there and visit my mother, then come back. Then, finally they said, “No more jumpin’ around.” They got wise. They said, “Show up at Gratiot and Nine Mile Road.” So I stayed out for a year. I stayed out long enough, probably to save my life. Because everybody was killing. Guys was comin’ back from Guadalcanal and everything … legs shot off and arms. I know my buddy, Boots Hampton, he got back from Guadalcanal, and he’d been shot up and everything. He was older. …
How did you first meet Roy Hall?
I think he come into the West Fort and got a job when I was playing. I was playing guitar there and he come into the bar, and the owner gave him a job playing piano. From there, he went out to the Caravan, and all over. I know he was playing at Port Huron. I went up to Port Huron with him and played up there some. …
Listen to: Roy Hall and his Cohutta Mtn Boys, feat. Tommy Odom – Okee Doaks
Last time I seen him, he was playing down in Nashville. He come up here on the weekend and he was driving that guy’s car … He had a lot of records …
Webb Pierce?
Not Webb Pierce. Wait a minute! That’s who it was. Yeah, he was driving his car. … I know he had “Webb Pierce” on the side of it. We was playing on Fort Street – me and Christine. [4] He wouldn’t have a drink in there. He said, “Come on with me.” We went across the street and had … I guess half a dozen shots. He wouldn’t have but one shot. He said, “I gotta drive.” He owed me [fifty dollars], so he said, “Here’s thirty dollars.” I was so broke I said, “I’ll take the thirty dollars – just forget the twenty.” I never seen anymore of him. He went back down to Nashville. And when I heard any more about him, I heard he died. [5]
Click here to read part two, which includes a Tommy Odom discography; and Odom reflects on the many Detroit nightclubs he played, and musicians he knew, including Bob Mitchell, and Frankie Brumbalough.
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Notes
- Tommy Odom interviewed by Keith Cady and Craig Maki in 2001.
- “Tarzan” also was the name of Ken Maynard’s horse.
- Now the site of legendary Motz’s Burgers.
- Christine [surname unknown] played a cocktail drum.
- Roy Hall died in 1984. Hall’s story is included in the book “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
In the spring of 1997, Eddie Jackson and his buddies planned a night out to see his friend Everett “Swanee” Caldwell Jr., a country singer with a few minor hits under his belt, who spent five decades entertaining in Detroit. Caldwell was appearing several nights a week at the Crackerjack lounge on Gratiot Road in Roseville, Michigan. I’d seen Caldwell pick guitar and sing solo at gatherings in Jackson’s home, so I tagged along, excited to hear Caldwell perform with a full band.
We entered the lounge single file. The place was packed. “Hello, Craig.” I looked toward the stage as I heard Caldwell’s voice over the speakers, and he gave me a smile when he caught my eye. All night long he greeted customers who walked through the entrance – many by name, and he invited musicians in the crowd to sit in with the band.
With Marv Weyer playing lead guitar, I sang Elvis Presley’s “I’m Left, You’re Right, She’s Gone.” “Do another one,” said Caldwell from a table in front of the stage. We played “Let The Teardrops Fall,” originally cut by T. Texas Tyler and Patsy Cline, while Caldwell mingled with his audience, which included many regulars who followed him from gig to gig through the years. As he returned to the stage, Caldwell was kind enough to compare me to himself when he was in his twenties.
West ‘by God’ Virginia
He was born in “Logan, West – by God – Virginia.” [1] Publicity from the 1960s stated January 6, 1935, as his date of birth. [2] However, his obituary in the Detroit Free Press said he was 71 years old, which pegged the year 1929. [3] Biographies said he arrived in Detroit around 1952. To avoid working in the coal mines near Logan, Caldwell served overseas in the army after high school. [4]
In Detroit, Caldwell hired into factories, while getting noticed in nightclubs by playing bass (first upright, then electric) and singing with a variety of country musicians. Eventually he worked at the Ford plant in Wixom by day, and led a group called the “Rock-A-Billies” in Detroit bars at night. His nickname came from a habit of singing Stephen Foster’s “Old Folks At Home” (a.k.a. “Swanee River”) to warm up his voice.
In 1959 and 1960, guitarist Al Allen recorded Caldwell’s first records in the basement of his home. The Clix label, of Troy, Michigan, issued two singles. The Happy Hearts Record Company, based in Wayne, pressed his next single around 1961. Caldwell described these early efforts as having a “Bill Haley rock beat.” However, he excelled with the slow numbers. Caldwell sold these records mainly in local clubs and jamborees where he entertained.
Listen to: Tear Stained Guitar – Swanee Caldwell
Caldwell’s recorded output and notoriety soared during the 1960s, as he cut music for eight other labels: New Star (1962, also issued on Bethlehem), King (1963-64), Sims (1964), Rich (1965), Boone (1966), Evers (ca. 1967), and Caravan (1967, Eddie Jackson’s label). His sides for King were cut in Cincinnati, Ohio, and included the Hometowners, WLW radio staff musicians and singers. Caldwell’s versions of “Tear Stained Guitar” and “Six Days On The Road” sold fairly well on King. One local favorite from his King sessions was “Don’t You Know,” a remake of a song introduced in 1958 by the Lucky Lee Trio (on Fox). Dave Larsh, who played guitar in the trio, also gigged with Caldwell for several years.
Swanee Caldwell appeared on TV and radio around Southeast Michigan and Southwest Ontario, as well as on “Grand Ole Opry” shows touring the region. He visited the annual disk jockey conventions in Nashville, Tennessee, where he cut his music after leaving King Records.
Fast horses, fast friends
He continued working in the factory and headlining in Detroit bars during the 1970s and 1980s, often inviting Eddie Jackson to share the stage with him. Country radio disk jockey Deano Day broadcast many nights from Caldwell’s venues such as the 3-Star on 8 Mile Road. Beyond these activities, he found time to invest in racehorses.
After retiring from Ford in 1985, Caldwell increased his performance schedule to three or more nights a week, presenting crowds with a tasteful mix of current country radio hits and classic favorites. Although Caldwell wasn’t a songwriter, his popularity resulted from his expert vocals, friendly personality and humor, and professional bands.
In 1999, Caldwell said “so long” to his fans and left the clubs. He passed away February 26, 2000. Caldwell’s visitation a few days later inspired what seemed like a grand reunion of Detroit musicians and country music radio personalities, and I ran into my friend, disk jockey Keith Cady (Keith Jason on WSDS Ypsilanti). He couldn’t get over all the stories floating around the room. “We need to document this, before too many others go the way Swanee has,” he said.
“Buddy, I have been kicking myself for not recording an interview with Swanee,” I replied. At the time, I hosted a show on public radio in Detroit. “I’ve thought about writing a book,” I said. “We should collaborate and see what we come up with.”
Click here to see what we came up with.
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Notes
- Swanee Caldwell conversations with Craig Maki, 1995-98.
- “Walled Lake Men’s Club of Michigan Christian College presents Big Country Music Show” Souvenir program (Nov. 28, 1964) Self-published: Walled Lake, Michigan.
- “Everett (Swanee) Caldwell” Obituary in the Detroit Free Press (Feb. 29, 2000)
- Paul Wade. “Southern As The Name Implys [sic] – Swanee Caldwell” Music City News – Michigan Supplement (Feb. 1967. Vol. 2, No. 2) 1, 4.
PLEASE NOTE: Event hours for the first Detroit Country Music book event have expanded to 7 p.m. However, our special guests may leave by 6 p.m.
Last June marked the forty-first anniversary of a monster country music fair celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of WEXL radio, Royal Oak, held at Swiss Valley Park near Utica. The organizers (who included WEXL’s Joe Patrick, and musician Ford Nix) produced an eleven-hour event of continuous entertainment. Because the station was synonymous with country and folk music from its first old-time religious broadcasts during the 1920s, to its adoption of a twenty-four-hour country music format in 1962 (the first Detroit area station to do so), the 1973 “Country Music Fair” not only represented a celebration of fifty years, but recognized the long history of country music in Detroit.
According to Billboard magazine, the celebration began with “Sunday morning church services, and then a continuous show from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. with six hours of live remote broadcasting.” The showcase featured Michigan-based talent, along with the Grand Ole Opry’s George Morgan, guest star of the day. [1]
In his 1948 self-published biography, WEXL founder Jacob B. Sparks wrote that the station was created by Robert Miller and his father A.G. Miller in 1924, with the original call letters WAGM. “The station was the third in Michigan and the 298th in the United States,” wrote Sparks. [2]
By 1929, the Millers decided they bit off more than they could chew, and Sparks created the Royal Oak Broadcasting Company to purchase the station. From then on, religious programming performed by local musicians dominated its schedule, although by the end of the following decade WEXL boasted several cowboy and Hawaiian music shows.
During the years after World War II and into the 1950s, Cousin George Cross and Jack Ihrie presided over the “Sagebrush Melodies” record party during the middle of the day. Ihrie in particular proved a popular emcee at major country music events in Detroit. In 1962, the station went all-country with guidelines requiring disk jockeys to air popular records compiled in WEXL listener surveys, at least one record by a local artist every hour, at least one religious song each shift, and listener requests. WEXL also broadcast live music from local nightclubs. By 1967, the WEXL Country Club boasted 50,000 fan members.
Musicians Loyd Howell and Don Rye, founders and operators of the Ry-Ho Records label in Romulus assembled a small book to commemorate WEXL’s anniversary. In the introduction of “50 Years of Detroit Country Music” Pam Howell declared, “Country music is as American as Plymouth Rock … and is fast becoming the world’s number one music.” [3] Inside its pages appeared “The WEXL Story” by Loyd Howell, historic photos of WEXL from Sparks’ book, as well as portraits in pictures and words of WEXL staff, and Detroit C&W entertainers such as Curly Dan, Joe Pain, Uncle Jack Hilsinger, and Joy Jean.
One year later, the Sparks family caved to industry pressures (brought in part by the 1970 introduction of the top-forty country radio format at WJBK radio) and returned its broadcasts to religious programs. Also in 1974, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources purchased the land Swiss Valley Park was built on.
Crawford Broadcasting now operates WEXL “Glory” 1340. And the hand-built structures that once adorned Swiss Valley Park have been removed, with the old park now a nature reserve called Holland Ponds.
Despite countless changes of venues, outlets, and artists, country and folk music in Detroit reaches back more than 90 years – a fact as solid as Plymouth Rock.
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Notes
- “Station Sets Golden Anniv. With Fair,” Billboard (May 26, 1973. Vol. 85, No. 21), 46.
- Jacob B. Sparks, Jacob’s Well of Life: The Autobiography of Jacob B. Sparks (Detroit: Self-published, 1948) 125.
- Don Rye, Loyd and Pam Howell, 50 Years of Detroit Country Music (Romulus, Michigan: Self-published, 1973) 1.
As the Davis Sisters’ first RCA-Victor single, “I Forgot More Than You’ll Ever Know,” rose into the top of Billboard magazine’s country-western charts during the dog days of summer 1953, a midnight car accident claimed the life of lead singer Betty Jack Davis. Skeeter Davis, the other member of the duo and a survivor of the crash, fell into a depression while she recovered in hospital, and then in the home of Betty Jack’s parents near Covington, Kentucky. With encouragement from the Davis family, and commitment from Betty Jack’s older sister Georgie, the Davis Sisters soon returned to the road, to take advantage of the record’s popularity.
Nearly two years before, Betty Jack and Skeeter moved to Detroit, Michigan, at the invitation of bandleader Casey Clark, to sing on the WJR “Big Barn Frolic” radio jamboree, as well as personal appearances that producers Norman J. O’Neill, David Abadaher, and Clark booked in the region. O’Neill, a Detroit-based construction business owner, provided personal management to the Davis Sisters. In May 1953, Betty Jack and Skeeter made their first session for RCA-Victor in Nashville, Tennessee, and moved back to Kentucky. When Georgie stepped into her new role, the women cut ties with O’Neill. The Davis Sisters toured North America with major C&W entertainers, appeared as guests on barn dance radio programs, including the “Grand Ole Opry,” and recorded new songs until 1956, when Georgie settled down with her family, and Skeeter began singing solo.
On May 26, Memorial Day 2014, Craig Maki and Keith Cady visited with Georgie Davis. Here are highlights from the conversation.
Gotta Git A-Goin’
Georgie: We worked with [bandleader] Pee Wee King a lot. He took me on my first plane ride – insisted! I wasn’t gonna do it. No way, was I gonna get on that plane. And all the time he was scootin’ me along, and he got me right up there before I knew I was on it. Scared me to death. … He always had to get somewhere quick, so if he decided we were gonna sing with him, he’d take us with him. Because if he left us here, we might not get there [on time]. So that’s why he pushed us on the plane. But we worked with all of them. They’re all great, all of them. Eddy Arnold … There’s no better than Eddy Arnold. … We went all the way to California with him, doing show dates all the way. And Elvis [Presley] too. Elvis was on it.
Keith: What was your impression of Elvis?
Georgie: Well, he was a spoiled brat. [laughs] But, we learned to love him anyway. I love him even more, now. He was just somebody you had to, kinda, you know, deal with. He thought he was, uh … This is not a real good story for you young fellas, but – he loved the girls, and the girls loved him, of course – he walked in our dressing room unannounced, and I got mad at him. I said, “Listen here! You knock on that door when you walk in!” That didn’t mean anything to him, as far as that goes, but he never did walk in again. … He was a good guy, and he turned out to be a great guy.
Craig: When you were touring with the [RCA] Country Western Caravan, did you ride buses or cars? How did you travel?
Georgie: We were on a bus, hitting every city on that particular tour. It was a long tour and a lot of work, no sleep, and all that kind of stuff. Skeeter and I actually fell asleep on stage one night, because we couldn’t find any place to sleep. So we kind of curled up in a corner and took a little nap. [laughs] I don’t think anyone ever knew it, because they never mentioned it.
Craig: You were on the “Ozark Jubilee.”
Georgie: I was, but I don’t know if it’s in writing or not. Because I was filling in for … Kitty Wells. She couldn’t make it that night. And [Red Foley] asked me if I would sing with him. I said, “Sure” … But I think the papers would show that Kitty Wells was the singer on that show, even though it wasn’t.
Craig: I noticed on the [Davis Sisters] record, “I’ve Closed The Door,” you’re listed as one of the songwriters, along with Skeeter. Did you have a process for songwriting? Or picking songs to do? Did [someone] give you songs to do?
Georgie: Well, we more or less picked them. They’d give us so many, and then we had to choose from that, what they gave us. Because they had writers, you know, coming out of their ears. There were just plenty of writers. But, if they said we want you to do this, we did it, simple as that, I guess.
Keith: Did you ever find yourself recording a song that you …
Georgie: Didn’t like? Yeah. I can’t remember names of everything nowadays. … It was great fun, I can say that. … We took my oldest daughter – she was just a little tot, then – we’d take her with us, where we went. She loved it. She’d even stand on the stage and do some singing. [Editor’s note: Georgie had been married for several years before she joined the Davis Sisters act.]
Craig: Did you have a manager?
Georgie: Not really. The manager that they had when Betty Jack died was the only manager that they had. So, from different things that he had done, we decided that we didn’t want a manager. We’d do it ourselves.
Craig: So you were independent?
Georgie: Yeah, we were.
Craig: That must have taken some work.
Georgie: It did. But they would get in touch with us, if they wanted us on the show … and it was either yes or no, but most of the time it was yes. We’d go. We never had any qualms about it. We were always treated good. Nothing bad ever happened to us.
Fiddle Diddle Boogie
Keith: Before Skeeter and B.J. got together as the Davis Sisters and started recording, did you and your sister sing locally, as kids growing up? How did you get into music?
Georgie: We always sang, but we didn’t do anything, you know, in the music field. We just sang for our own amusement, and loved to sing. … We sang at church, and at places where we were asked to sing, like that. … We didn’t get paid for it, and I wasn’t looking for pay, at the time. We were just singing. We loved singing.
Keith: When did you first start singing [professionally]?
Georgie: When Betty Jack died, then I HAD to start singing, right then. The plan was that I would sing with them later. Because I had a little girl, we were going to wait until she got just a little bit bigger, and I was gonna be the third one singing. But because of that [accident], in order for us to, say, get a payday from our record, we had to start singing right then. Skeeter said, “Why don’t you sing with me now?” So that’s the way that we did it. Whether we could sing or not, [chuckles] we did it! But it worked out, it worked out OK.
Keith: When you and your sister sang together, would you sing harmony together?
Georgie: Yes. All our life.
Keith: Do you remember who would sing what part?
Georgie: I always did the harmony part, at that time. But Skeeter did the harmony on the records.
Keith: Right. That’s why I was curious [to know] if you would sing harmony with Betty Jack.
Georgie: Yes, I did.
Keith: Skeeter always sang the harmony on the records. Did you guys ever switch on other songs on the road, at all?
Georgie: No, I don’t think so. I don’t think we ever did that. They had us record so many songs at one time in New York. You know, they just kept piling them on, they didn’t want to run out of Davis Sisters, or run out of music, or something. So we did a whole lot of songs that we didn’t even like that much.
You’re Gone
Craig: Do you know if there were any plans to do an album?
Georgie: I have to say no, because I didn’t know about it, if they had any ideas about it. … Skeeter had a hit record – you probably know all about Skeeter [and] her hit records. She had a lot of hit records. And she did very well, with everything. So, I just kind of faded out of the picture. So that she could have her time.
Keith: Was that a conscious effort on your part? How was it decided to dissolve the Davis Sisters?
Georgie: Well, I don’t know exactly how that happened. I don’t know that we ever actually said, “We quit.” Because they would come back, occasionally, and want us to do something, and we’d turn it down, or we’d try to do it. Whichever it was.
Keith: So maybe, over the course of time, you just got to where you weren’t doing shows anymore?
Georgie: Right. Just not doing it. … But Skeeter tried to get us back together, shortly before she died. She thought it was time to get the Davis Sisters back together, and I was going over that in my mind, “Yeah, maybe so.” Different people would tell her, “She [Georgie] may not want to do that anymore. She’s been gone a long time.” And then she’d call and say, “Don’t you think we need to get the Davis Sisters back together?” It never happened.
Keith: It’s too bad. That would have been terrific to see you two, together.
Georgie: I regret it.
Tomorrow I’ll Cry
Keith: Do you get a chance to listen to your old records?
Georgie: Well, occasionally … I don’t do that often, ‘cause I cry too much. So I can’t let myself do that every day.
Keith: Happy tears, I hope?
Georgie: Well, some of them are. But they’re still tears. [chuckles] But yes, I love to sit down and listen to them once in a while. I’m usually by myself when I do that. You know, Betty Jack meant so much to us, some things can make me cry about her, you know, her life. And she loved music so much. She was the talent. Of the three of us, she was the talent. And it just broke my heart.
Craig: Everyone we spoke with who knew her, or had seen her in Detroit, remembered her as being a great singer. They were surprised at how young she was. … She was a very accomplished young lady, as far as singing [goes].
Georgie: She was the only one of us who could play an instrument. She was the only one that could do anything, really. She was just “it,” and we depended on her to lead us through it. Skeeter did great. She, of course, ended up with a lot of hit records. She did great.
Keith: You said your plan was for all three of you to sing together. Did the three of you ever sing together … ?
Georgie: At home?
Keith: … at parties and things?
Georgie: At home, yeah. We knew that we could do it. We just didn’t get the opportunity to get it done.
Everlovin’
Keith: Do you remember there being a most-requested song that you had?
Georgie: “I Forgot More” was our big hit, so we had to do that a lot. Every time we got up to sing, we had to do that one.
Keith: Did you get a chance to do some of your originals? I know you got a chance to record some originals. When you did live shows, did you get to do some of those, as well? Or was it just what you were asked to do?
Georgie: Whatever we felt that people wanted to hear at that particular time – you know, music changes pretty often, and at that time we’d just do whatever they requested. And sometimes it was somebody else’s song that we would do.
Craig: When we spoke on the phone … you mentioned that Andy Griffith was a favorite personality you ran into.
Georgie: Oh, yes. We loved him. He was on our show, the last show that we did. We went to California with Eddy Arnold. And him and Elvis, and all of us was on this one stage, you know. It was just great. So I have a good memory of that one.
Craig: Where was that? Was that in Los Angeles?
Georgie: Ummm. What studio would that have been? Now I can’t remember names. I don’t know which one it was. … There were so many towns on that trip. And we all went in … buses – not regular buses, but people’s buses. There was several of us. It was a whole line of traffic, you know. And Minnie Pearl. Is Minnie Pearl still alive?
Keith: No, she’s passed away.
Georgie: See, I haven’t been in Nashville for a long time. So I don’t know what’s going on. … We’ve got a … museum, here in Devou Park [the Behringer-Crawford Museum] … got the Davis Sisters in it. [They’ve] got a lot of stuff in there, from us.
Craig: We’ll have to visit that.
Georgie: I’m real proud of it. It’s great. They really did it well.
Craig: Thank you so much for letting us stop by, and for sharing your memories.
Georgie: Oh, it’s been fun.
Click here to read the post of session details, see photos, and hear sound clips of the Davis Sisters in Detroit, featuring Betty Jack. To read more about Casey Clark and the WJR “Big Barn Frolic,” see the book “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
During the 1940s, one of the best-known voices of Detroit radio was the mellow baritone of John “Smilin’ Red” Maxedon. He sang cowboy songs with reassuring ease over WJBK and WJR stations every day. Click here to read part one. In 1946 he began recording songs for Arcadia Records.
The Mercury Rangers, the group on Maxedon’s 1946 recordings for Arcadia Records (based on Cass Avenue, but Maxedon’s first releases had a New York City office address printed on labels) included twin fiddles, bass, guitar, and accordion. The Blue Mountain Girls assisted with harmony vocals at his next sessions. Arcadia business partners Lester Docking and Richard W. Pascoe provided the songs, including “I Fell In Love” (catalog no. AO-600-A) and ditties about the old west, as well as wartime service. [1] The bouncy “I Left My Boots And Saddle Home” (AO-600-B) included the refrain: I left my boots and saddle home / Just to make a little Jeep go [2]
Other songs such as “I’ll Be Back” and “Keep Smiling Till We’re Together Again” described soldiers leaving friends and family to join a war. Maxedon’s Arcadia records all featured impeccable musical arrangements often led by two or three fiddles that resembled Spade Cooley’s style of western swing. Maxedon avoided cutting dance music in favor of sentimental songs that idealized the past, western life, and romance.
In 1946, Maxedon formed a partnership with Tim Doolittle’s vocalist (and niece) Dottie Leader (whom Maxedon later married) at WJBK radio, then joined Tim Doolittle and his Pine Center Gang at WJR through 1947. The duo also teamed up with disk jockeys Guy “Brother Bill” Bowman and Harry “Shorty” Smith of the WJBK “Hillbilly Hit Parade,” a four-hour radio show devoted to country music records and requests, at western movie openings in theaters around town. [3]
He resumed recording for Arcadia in 1949. These records included an electric guitarist playing “take off” style. [4] In 1949, Leader cut a version of Vernon Dalhart’s 1926 hit “I Want A Pardon For Daddy” on one side of a Maxedon single. She sang harmony on a few other titles, helping to extend the number of Maxedon’s Arcadia sides to about a dozen.
In 1949, Maxedon worked with accordionist Pee Wee Linden (formerly with Maxedon in the Goodwill-Billies) and steel guitarist Johnnie White (of the Rhythm Riders) on a record pressed by a custom manufacturing and song publishing agency, Wrightman, based in Hollywood, Calif., (Wrightman 1033/1034).
Although Maxedon’s Arcadia and Wrightman records presented high-class productions one would expect from an artist featured so prominently on major Detroit radio stations, his performances were very much rooted in cowboy music of earlier decades. The songs Maxedon recorded (e.g., “In My Heart There’s A Part Of The Prairie,” “When It’s Nighttime In Nevada” – both by Detroit-based songwriter Will E. Dulmage), the wistful way in which he interpreted them, and even his views on folk music as revealed in the opening quotation to part one of this story, showed that he himself longed for the musical environment that existed prior to World War II. In contrast, during the early 1950s his brother Roy led his own band in California as “Smiley” Maxedon and cut some hardcore honky tonk for Columbia Records with titles such as “We Can’t Live Together” and “Give Me A Red Hot Mama And An Ice Cold Beer.” [5]
Listen to: Smilin’ Red Maxedon – In My Heart There’s A Part Of The Prairie (Arcadia AP1948)
Left his boots and saddle home
Maxedon carried on for several more years in Detroit, leading a vocal trio and performing at the openings of cowboy movies in local theaters. In 1953 he performed with Justice “Cowboy” Colt (son of Brace Beemer, a radio actor who provided the voice of WXYZ radio’s “Lone Ranger” series) at WXYZ-TV on a children’s program called “The Circle G-R Ranch.” With the popularity of cowboy music on the wane across America, and after divorcing Leader during the late 1950s, Maxedon moved to Houston, Texas. “He was selling cars … and playing on the side,” said Roy Maxedon. “He wasn’t playing [on the] radio or anything [like that].” Smilin’ Red passed away March 24, 1984, and Dottie in May of 1996. [6]
*************************************
Notes
- “Coinmen You Know” Billboard (December 20, 1947. Vol. 59, No. 51) 99. “Lester Docking and Richard W. Pascoe, of Arcadia Records, are bringing out a series of Smilin’ Red Maxedon releases.”
- “I Left My Boots And Saddle Home” (Lester Docking) APRS, c/of Peer Music (Arcadia AO-600, 1946)
- “American Folk Tunes” Billboard (March 27, 1948. Vol. 60, No. 13) 165.
- The guitarist on Maxedon’s late sessions for Arcadia could have been Detroit jazz guitarist Bob Mitchell.
- Smiley Maxedon made recordings for Columbia Records with his Okaw Valley Boys between 1951 and 1954. Smiley lost his voice in 1958. After recovering his voice in 1975, Smiley returned to the honky tonks until he retired in 1978. “’Course, my kind of singin’ was outdated by that time,” he said. “They got that rock’n’roll and other stuff I didn’t know nothin’ about.” Smiley Maxedon died in June 2001. Roy “Smiley” Maxedon interviewed by Keith Cady in 2001.
- Date of Red Maxedon’s death provided by Roy Maxedon.
In a lifespan of more than 40 years, WSDS AM 1480 was perhaps the longest continuously operating country music station in the midwest. The station would change hands only twice and stay true to the country sounds that brought the station fame.
About 1957, University of Michigan Law School graduate Craig Davids stumbled upon a pasture near the old Peninsular Paper factory at 580 W. Clark Road in Ypsilanti, just east of Ann Arbor. He saw its future as an addition to his radio portfolio. Davids, along with his wife Kathleen and brother-in-law, owned WCER Charlotte, Michigan, but dreamed of building one closer to home. David Carmine, who broadcast at WYSI, and later WEXL, was there from the beginning.
“I was actually still in high school in Plymouth at the time, and was fascinated with radio – and in particular engineering – so I was out here more or less as an intern,” said Carmine. “Later on they said, ‘We’d like to pay you what you’re worth, but we know you can’t work that cheap, so…’ [laughs] Basically we were out here, and there was nothing but cows and a pasture. This woulda been ’60, ’61 when we broke ground on the building. The process even back then was lengthy and then it became even lengthier because there were a few technical snafus with the engineering after the building and towers were up, and that put a year, year and a half moratorium on the station getting on the air, ’til those problems were resolved. They were resolved and we finished construction. I say ‘we’ … There were a number of people involved besides myself. Jerry Adams, who was Chief Engineer for the Charlotte station was very much instrumental in building this place and oversaw the engineering.”
In 1962 the station signed on the air with 500 watts of directional, daytime power at 1480kHz as WYSI Ypsilanti – in a rather unconventional way. Greg Siefker, who went on to own WMLM radio St. Louis, Michigan, remembered listening the day they switched on the Gates transmitter. “They didn’t sign on at a normal time. During the morning, they fed a tone and then took to the airwaves at about 11 a.m. It was all very exciting for a young teenager who absolutely loved radio … and who couldn’t know at the time that he’d be working at the station one day.”
Early disk jockeys
The Ypsilanti Broadcasting Company, led by Program Director Don Thompson, began as a rock-n-roll station. Originally from Minnesota, Thompson broadcast daily from 3 p.m. until sign-off as “Bootsy Bell.” Carmine said of Thompson, “He drove the concept of the programming. He was very much into high-energy personality rock-n-roll.”
John Fountain signed on the station at 5:30 a.m. and spun records until David Carmine, known as “Dave Carr,” came in and took control from 9 a.m. ’til noon. Don McComb broadcast from noon to 3 p.m., when Bootsy Bell rocked the studio to its core. Weekends saw an ever-changing lineup of jocks and block programming, particularly on Sundays when religious programs dominated the time slots. Weekend jocks included Andy Barron (Andrew Spisak), Jim Hampton, Johnny Dew, and Marty James (Jim Martin). News and sales were handled by Jack Bobicz. Clara Hoedema gave weather reports and served as WYSI secretary along with Pat Tomkins. Al Berg was station manager.
Tom Chase, a.k.a. Johnny Williams
Legendary Detroit radio voice Johnny Williams, of CKLW Windsor/Detroit fame in the ’60s and ’70s started his career on Clark Road as Tom Chase in 1964.
“I was going to Eastern Michigan [University], driving in from Allen Park every day and listening to this station, listening to Bootsy Bell,” said Williams. “And I thought, ‘Oh my God, he is the worst jock I have heard in my life!’ (Sorry Don.) At the time I remember saying to myself, ‘I can do better than that.’ Of course I couldn’t, but at the time your ego is there. I had a great friend, Dave Kelly who owned a station up north. Dave and I went to high school together. I called Dave up and said, ‘Do me a favor. Write me a letter of recommendation. I wanna take it to WYSI and get a job, you know, weekends.’ He said, ‘You’re never gonna get away with that. But I’ll do it for you.’ So I picked it up, and I called the radio station. Didn’t know who to ask for, they put me in touch with Ed Smitt, General Manager. And I told him I was going to Eastern Michigan and I wanted to do something on weekends. Was there anything available? He said, ‘You’re in luck! Yes, Saturday and Sunday. Talk to Don Thompson.’ So I’m thinking, OK, he’s the program director. No clue that he’s really Bootsy Bell. So I come in for the interview, and I’d never been in a radio station in my life and I started asking all these stupid questions and Don says, ‘You’ve never been in a station, have you!?’ I said no. He swore a little bit and said, ‘Well I’m not going on the air Saturday and Sunday so you better sit down and learn!’ That first Saturday, I drove in and I was so nervous – I stopped the car a couple of times, and I said, ‘No, you gotta do this!’ I got to the building, walked up to the door. The engineer was, of course, sleeping on the couch like he usually was, and I turned around and I threw up. I turned around, got back into the car and drove to a gas station and cleaned up and I said, ‘Well, you better do this or you’ll never know if you can do this.’ So I came back and went on the air. That was 1964.”
“Gary Stevens had the biggest numbers for afternoon drive in the history of Detroit radio,” said Williams. “He was on WKNR [Dearborn, Michigan], a 27-share in the afternoon. That’s like, unheard of! Anyway, I was here at WYSI maybe three weeks, and I have a rock-n-roll band I manage. We were supposed to be appearing for Gary Stevens at this club. I was at the club talking to Gary, the band’s not there yet, and he said, ‘You’re TC from twelve to three.’ And I went, ‘WHAT? How in the world would you know something like that? You’re like THEE jock. How would you know that?’ He said, ‘The general manager and I were driving through Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti going to the University of Michigan. President [John F.] Kennedy was giving the commencement speech and we were flipping the dial around and we hit you and left you on. The manager said, “Hey this kid’s gonna be good”.’ He said, ‘How long you been doing this, a year or two?’ I said, ‘Three weeks.’ And that spurred me on to stay in the business. If this guy believed in me, then I could definitely do this and make a living at it.” As Tom Chase, Williams stayed at WYSI, playing top 20 hits for almost two years and moonlighting in the news department at WPAG radio Ann Arbor before accepting a job as news castor at WJEF radio Grand Rapids. From there he made the switch to “The Big 8” CKLW [AM 800], and into Detroit radio history.
George Young
By 1965, WEXL radio Royal Oak, in a Detroit suburb, had already switched to a full-time country music format. WYSI also added a few country programs, hosted by Dave Carr, and Andy Barron. Musician Red Ellis, who also worked at WAAM radio Ann Arbor as an engineer, performed his brand of country gospel over WYSI, which he recorded for various local labels, as well as Starday Records of Nashville, Tennessee. WYSI paperwork revealed Ellis bargained to trade commercials for a piano from the Ypsilanti Piano & Organ Company in 1965.
Another popular music act in Detroit and downriver communities was George Young and The Youngsters. Young replaced Tom Chase on Saturdays with a studio record show, and later added live and pre-taped broadcasts with his band from various venues in Metro Detroit. “First time I walked into the studio, I was supposed to go on at twelve noon,” said Young, “and Smitt (the general manager) brought me into the studio to go on. He said, ‘You’re on in five minutes.’ So he walked out, and I was all new to this. He said, ‘There’s the log.’ To tell you the truth, I didn’t know what a log was! Here I am, nervous as hell – excuse the expression, that’s an old radio term [laughs] – and I’m looking around, about to throw up because Tom [Chase] left, and I’m all alone with Bootsy Bell. … So I look at the log and it said, ‘Weather on the reel-to-reel.’ Well, Johnny Williams never showed me how to put the reel-to-reel on! I didn’t even know I was going on the air! So I look at Bootsy Bell (or Don Thompson) and I said, ‘Man, how do you put the reel-to-reel on, right here with the weather?’ He looked at me and says, ‘You’ll figure it out. You’re on after this record’ – and [he] walked out! Of course we used to make up the weather …”
In 1966, Dave Carr negotiated a format change that ignited a spark that burned for more than 40 years: the country sounds of the “Big 1480.”
