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I’ve always enjoyed going to clubs and watching the bands. There’s a lot of entertainment going on, up on the bandstand. This is one thing that I admired so much about Eddie Jackson and Frankie Meadows. These guys had the people out there dancing and they would involve their audience in the show. Guys like Eddie and Swanee Caldwell – they’re true entertainers, because they see someone come in the door and say, “Hi so-and-so” and call them by their names, “How are ya?” – Patti Lynn [1]
From the time she started singing in public, Patti Lynn’s vocal abilities, charm, and interest in all styles of country music attracted the support of Detroit musicians and bandleaders such as Ford Nix, Eddie Jackson, Billy Martin, and Frankie Meadows. Eddie Jackson wrote a song that graced her first record, on the Hi-Q label. A couple of years later, while Lynn worked bandstands with Frankie Meadows, Detroit producer Kit Wright signed her up with Indiana-based Glenn Records. Lynn quit performing for a few years to raise her children, then returned as Kelly Roberts during the 1970s. We’ll refer to her as Patti Lynn.
Born Patsy Waters and raised in Nantahala, North Carolina, in the state’s western mountains, Lynn arrived in Hazel Park, Michigan, with her parents and brother around 1954. She was 13 years old and had already been singing in church for most of her life. “My cousin and I sang together in church,” she said. “I was raised in a Baptist church, and we went to church Sunday morning, Sunday night and every Wednesday night. My uncle led the choir … and as soon as he found out we could sing, we were into it.”
According to Lynn, Nantahala is a Cherokee name meaning “Land of the Noonday Sun.” Lynn claimed Cherokee ancestry as well. Because of the family’s somewhat isolated location, within the Nantahala National Forest where many areas don’t receive direct sunlight until midday, Lynn grew up listening to country music radio from neighboring Tennessee.
We lived down in the mountains and the only radio programs we could get were the “Midday Merry-Go-Round” out of WNOX in Knoxville, Tennessee, at twelve o’clock every day. I remember Don Gibson singing “Sixteen Chickens And A Tambourine.” We would get the “Grand Ole Opry” on Saturday night. Back in those days, I grew up listening to the Maddox Brothers and Rose, Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper, Carl Smith, Goldie Hill. … So it had been like a mix of bluegrass and country. And I was seeing country coming out of bluegrass with the electric instruments.
“The first rockabilly song I remember hearing was Marty Robbins doing ‘That’s All Right,’ covering Elvis,” said Lynn. “I left North Carolina shortly after Elvis was on the scene and came to Michigan. Elvis was popular up here, but I thought, ‘Where’d Marty go?’ [laughs] But there’s never been a solid definition between bluegrass, country and rockabilly. To me, it was like a big family growing. Thank God, because I made a lot of friends in bluegrass. … When I was growing up, there was little definition between what was country and what was bluegrass. I saw musicians coming up to the bandstands and trying new things, and if it was good, the music evolved naturally into what it is today. I love Mac Wiseman, Bill Monroe and his Bluegrass Boys, Flatt and Scruggs – all of them.”
Ford Nix and his tricks
Around 1958, Lynn attended a house party and met musicians Grady Sartane and J.O. Turner. After hearing Lynn sing, Sartane invited her to join them at some shows he had booked in local high schools. It was during one of these appearances that Lynn first met Ford Nix. “He just started dragging me around with him, introducing me to people, and getting me up every chance [he had],” said Lynn.
He took me to a bar down in Detroit called Taylor’s Bar. Ford said, “You’re gonna get up there and sing.” And I said, “No, I’m not.” He said, “Yes, you are!” They called Ford up, and Ford introduced me. I was shakin’ like a leaf, and a fellow by the name of Ray Taylor was working there. Anyway, I got up and did three or four songs, and I really liked it. The people applauded, and I thought, well, I lived through this and I think I can do it again!
“One time I was working with Ford down at the Pullman Bar [in Highland Park], and they had chicken wire up around the band. That Pullman had a really bad reputation,” said Lynn. “But no, I’ve never had any problems. … Which is really amazing, because I saw a lot of fights, but I always tried to keep my nose clean and be a lady. Normally, if trouble broke out, they had bouncers to put a stop to it pretty quick.”
Listen to: Same Old Blues – Patti Lynn
Ford Nix introduced Lynn to WPON Pontiac disk jockey Billy Martin, when he was assembling the cast for his TV variety show on WLIX Channel 10 in Jackson. Martin’s “Michigan Jamboree” aired in 1960 for 26 weeks. Besides Martin, Nix and Lynn, entertainers included Martin’s band, the Drifting Wranglers, and vocalists Arizona Weston, Billy Gill, and Jimmy Odell. “When I first met Jimmy, he was playing a flattop [guitar] and singing,” said Lynn. “He had an excellent voice. Red Lynch was playing steel for Billy, and Jimmy was playing flattop and singing. A couple of years after I worked on the Billy Martin show, I ran into Jimmy and he was sitting behind a steel guitar! … I still believe the Detroit area in Michigan has some untapped resources of talent.”
After Martin’s TV show ended, Lynn tagged along with Ford Nix, Wendy Smith and their bluegrass band. Promoter Fay McGinnis booked them around the region.
Coming in Part Two: Patti Lynn meets Eddie Jackson, makes records
*************************
Notes
- Patti Lynn interviewed by Craig Maki in 1995.
Perhaps the most popular country singers in Detroit during the 1940s and 1950s, the York Brothers, George and Les, made the most important country music records in Detroit during the early 1940s. By 1942, the Yorks created a rocking sound with two guitars and bass, about a dozen years before artists such as Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash recorded with the same instrumentation at Sun Records in Memphis, Tennessee. The York Brothers story appears in the book “Detroit Country Music – Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
Here is a discography of the York Brothers’ recordings on Detroit labels. The amount of music they produced 1939 to 1944 is staggering, and gaps of information in the list below suggest this may not be all the Yorks recorded in Detroit. Thanks to Cappy Wortman, John Morris, Tony Russell, Bob Pinson, Dick Grant, Al Turner, Prague Frank, and Dave Sax for research that contributed to this list.
1939, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, acoustic take off guitar
Universal 105 “Hamtramck Mama” (Leslie York)
Universal 106 “Going Home”
Note: Universal 105 and 106 issued on a single disk together.
Listen to: York Brothers – Hamtramck Mama
ca. 1940, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, acoustic take off guitar; unknown (possibly Les York): Hawaiian steel guitar
Universal 107 “Highland Park Girl”
Universal 108 “Detroit Hulu Girl”
Note: Universal 107 and 108 issued on a single disk together.
ca. 1940, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, acoustic take off guitar
Universal 126 “Conscription Blues” (York Bros.)
Hot Wax 127 “That Nagging Young Husey” (York Bros.) (backed with “Hamtramck Mama”)
Note: Universal 126 and 402 (below) issued on a single disk together.
ca. 1940, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, acoustic take off guitar; unknown (possibly Les York): Hawaiian steel guitar
Universal 402 “Gamblers Blues” (York Bros.)
Universal 404 “Sweetheart Darling” (York Bros.)
Universal 405 “It Taint No Good” (York Bros.)
Note: Universal 405 appeared on Hot Wax and Mellow labels backed with Universal master 105, as well as Mellow backed with Mellow master 1105 (see below).
1942, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, electrically amplified take off guitar
Mellow 1619-A “Blue Skies Turned To Gray” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1619-B “I Don’t Want No Part Of You” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1620-A “I’ll Be Happy Again” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1620-B “Goodbye And Luck To You” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1621-A “Long Gone” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1621-B “Just Wanting You” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1622-A “Hail, Hail Ol’ Glory” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1622-B “Riding And Singing My Song” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1623-A “Hillbilly Rose” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1623-B “If I Would Never Lose You” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1624-A “Going Back To The Sunny South” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1624-B “Life Can Never Be The Same” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1625-A “We’re Gonna Catch That Train” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1625-B “It Makes Me Jealous Hearted” (George York)
1942, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, electrically amplified take off guitar, *acoustic guitar; unknown (poss. Johnnie Lavender), bass
Mellow 1105 “Hamtramck Mama” (version 2)
Mellow 1629 “In Old Tennessee” (Leslie York)* [one-sided disk?]
Mellow 1633-A “Memories Of You” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1633-B “New Trail To Mexico” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1634-A “Rose Of The Rio Grande” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1634-B “York Brothers Blues” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1635-A “Kentucky’s Calling Me”* (Leslie York)
Mellow 1635-B “Got To Get Rid Of My Worried Mind” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1636 “I Told The Moon About You” (Leslie York) [one-sided disk?]
Mellow 1637 (-A?) “Maybe Then You’ll Care” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1637 (-B?) “You Stayed Away Too Long” (Leslie York)
Listen to: York Brothers – A Merry Christmas To The Boys Over There
1942, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, electrically amplified take off guitar; Johnnie Lavender, bass
Mellow 1638-A “Going To The Shindig” (York Bros.)
Mellow 1638-B “Mother’s Sunny Smile” (York Bros.)
Mellow 1640-A “A Merry Christmas To The Boys Over There” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1641-B “Not Over Thirty-Five” (Leslie York)
Mellow 1642-A “I’ve Got My Eyes On You” (George York)
Mellow 1642-B “You’ll Pay For It All” (Leslie York)
Note: Mellow 1640-A and 1641-B issued together on one disk.
ca. 1942, Universal Recording Studios, 12942 E. Jefferson, Detroit, Michigan
George York: vocal, acoustic guitar; Leslie York: vocal, electrically amplified take off guitar; * unknown (possibly Les York): Hawaiian steel guitar; Johnnie Lavender, bass
Mellow 1662-A “The Stars In Heaven”
Mellow 1662-B “The Execution”
Mellow 1664-A “There’s No Stars In Heaven”
Mellow 1665-B “Hula Girl Wobble” (instrumental)*
Mellow 1666-A “You Lied To Me”
Note: These sides turned up as one-sided 78rpm disks with white paper labels and hand-written information (the matrix numbers were also etched into the deadwax of the records). It isn’t known if they were issued on Mellow as commercial records.
Listen to: York Brothers – I’ve Got My Eyes On You
1949, using “Rialto” as its label, Fortune Records reissued Universal master 402 “Conscription Blues” as “Calling Me,” with another act on the flip side.
Rialto R-118 B “Calling Me” York Brothers [Note: Same as “Conscription Blues” Universal/Hot Wax 402]
Rialto R-118 A “You Are My Sunshine” Cliff and his Cowboys [No evidence of the York Brothers playing on this track.]
1949, Fortune Records reissued Universal masters 105 and 107 together, apparently using the same metal stamper originally used for 105 on Universal and Hot Wax releases.
Fortune 120 “Hamtramck Mama”
Fortune 120 “Highland Park Girl”
1953, Fortune Records reissued Universal masters 106 and 108 together, apparently using the same metal stamper originally used for 106 on Universal release.
Fortune 180 “Detroit Hula Girl”
Fortune 180 “Going Home”
Ladies and gents, here ’tis, a blazing new read on Detroit music history: “Handsome Victory,” by Craig “Bones” Maki, featuring the rockabilly hit “I’m Gone.” Perfect for record hunting trips, or reading at the beach, this little pocketbook fits perfectly in the back pocket of your dungarees!
We begin with the story (a “remix,” and “extended take,” as some say in the music biz) of one of the least-known rockabilly 45s ever made in Detroit: Vic Gallon’s “I’m Gone.” Legendary guitarist Dennis Coffey — then known as “The Rock’n’Roll Kid,” who achieved his own No. 6 pop hit with the instrumental “Scorpio” in 1971 — said it was the first record he ever played on.
Here’s newly uncovered details about the studio where the record was made, and other artists who recorded there; rock’n’roll on Detroit radio in the 1950s; a survey of the waning years of Starday-King Records of Nashville; the early years of California country rock; surprising cameos by musicians who called Michigan home; and of course: what the heck happened to Vic Gallon! The book includes illustrations, scans of record labels, discographies, bibliography, index (a marvel of references), and suggested listening, including a playlist to go with the book, now available on YouTube here!
From the back cover:
Detroit, Michigan – 1957: A gifted young man’s basement recording studio, in a house on a quiet block in a northwest neighborhood, serves as ground zero for one of the most exciting — and elusive — rockabilly records ever made. With cool bearing, rock’n’roll singer Vic Gallon helps set teen-aged guitarist Dennis Coffey — a future member of the Motown Records “Funk Brothers” studio band — on a path toward greatness … and then disappears.
The story ends there, until you pick up this book!
How to get a-hold of your own copy of “Handsome Victory”
- If you live in the U.S., it’s for sale online at Lulu.com online here.
- “Handsome Victory” is available on major online sales platforms worldwide.
- Book shops may order copies through Ingram Content Group.
- Books signed by the author are available at The Book Beat in Oak Park, Michigan. Call ’em at (248) 968-1190, or send an email to info@thebookbeat.com.
Thanks, and have a ball, everybody! — Craig Maki
I was born to be a bluegrass picker and I really don’t know why I done that [rock’n’roll sessions in Detroit]. [Jack Brown] liked my singin’ and he called in a voice lady to train my voice a little bit. He told me, “Now go in there and sing just like you always sing.” I sang high and low … and she said, “I can’t teach him nothin’! He knows more about it than I do.” — Jimmy Lee Williams [1]
When Jimmy Lee Williams took a job in an auto factory in 1955, he was known among country musicians for playing mandolin with the Stanley Brothers, Mac Wiseman, and the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. In Detroit, his friends called him “Big Jim Williams” due to his tall stature, but decades later, the name on his records for Michigan’s Fortune and Clix labels made him famous around the world as “Jimmy Lee.”
* * * *
Born on Leap Day, 1932, in Wythe County, Virginia, near the Tennessee border, Williams listened to the region’s string band music on his grandparents’ battery-powered radio, and it inspired him to learn fiddle, mandolin and guitar. His cousin Paul Humphrey (a.k.a. Paul Williams) lived a mile up the road, and the boys often got together to pick and sing. After winning a talent contest at their high school in 1949, WMEV radio host Cousin Zeke hired Williams and Humphrey to perform at his station, located one county over in Marion, Virginia. Late in 1950, the boys rode a bus north to Bluefield, West Virginia, where Ezra Cline was holding auditions for his Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. When Cline asked what they called their act, the boys replied, “The Williams Brothers.” According to Humphrey: “We were on WHIS [radio]. It was 5,000 watts … which was pretty good. … We was on there every morning. Jimmy and Paul, the Williams Brothers, and Ezra Cline and the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. We did that almost two years. [Then] Jimmy went to work with Mac Wiseman. [The Lonesome Pine Fiddlers] had already auditioned for RCA-Victor and got the contract. That’s why it hurt so bad when Jimmy left, ’cause we had some stuff worked up.” [2]
Wiseman held a show at Bluefield’s Glenwood Park, and Williams replaced Ted Mullins on mandolin a few days after Wiseman’s appearance. Williams performed and recorded (for Dot Records) with Wiseman’s Country Boys until 1952, when he joined the Stanley Brothers (Carter and Ralph) at WCYB radio in Bristol, Tennessee. Besides working the road and radio, the Stanley Brothers cut several sides for Mercury Records while Williams was on board.
Halfway rock’n’roll
In 1955, Williams tired of traveling with the Stanley Brothers and called his brother, who worked for General Motors’ Cadillac factory in Detroit. With his wife and young son, Williams moved to Michigan and started work the morning after he arrived. Outside of the factory, he looked for opportunities to pick with local musicians and jammed with Jimmy Martin, the York Brothers, Frank Wakefield, Ford Nix, Bill Napier [3] and others, but didn’t join any groups.
One day in 1956, Williams met Fortune Records owner Jack Brown and cut a record for the label. Shortly after that session (possibly later that year, or in early 1957), Williams cut another two songs and handed that tape to John Henson of Troy, Michigan, for the earliest-known record issued on his Clix label.
Earlier that year, East Tennessee native Buster Turner cut an unorthodox bluegrass record with electric guitar for Brown (“That Old Heartbreak Express,” Fortune 187) in Detroit. [4] A few weeks later, Brown issued Williams’ first solo record, which sounded like bluegrass musicians playing rhythm and blues. Williams said the musicians he recorded with — at both sessions — were unknown to him, and the music on his records surprised his friends.
At the Fortune studio, located in a seedy section of Third Street, Williams set aside his mandolin for a flattop guitar, and recorded his songs “You Ain’t No Good For Me” and “Sad And Lonely.” Drenched in tape echo, both songs featured electric guitar and a snare drum. In the previous two years, rock’n’roll records steadily gained ground in popularity, and some country musicians, usually with encouragement from their record companies, experimented with the trend. In 1954, Elvis Presley’s first record included a remake of bluegrass monarch Bill Monroe’s “Blue Moon Of Kentucky” with a boogie beat, and rockabilly musician Charlie Feathers, Presley’s neighbor in Memphis, Tennessee, once declared that the rockabilly style was a combination of bluegrass and “cotton patch blues.” [5]
“I knew rock’n’roll was goin’ real big,” said Williams. “I said, ‘Well, mine’s halfway rock’n’roll … and I don’t know what the rest of it is!’ I had a big ol’ guitar with leather wrapped around, and I had my name wrote on it (Jimmy Lee). That record played pretty good there, in Royal Oak [on WEXL radio]. One of the announcers (I think he was pulling my leg a little bit) said, ‘Hey man, that sounds a whole lot like Elvis!’ But I got better sense than that. I just cut the record, and on the side I was pickin’ bluegrass. I never did try to do anything with it.”
In October 1956, a record reviewer at Detroit’s Teen Life newspaper wrote the following: “Another recording artist joining the Elvis Presley gold rush is Jimmy Lee on Fortune. Jimmy is a little high for Elvis. He hits some real high soprano notes that sound like Nolan Strong.” [6]
In lyrics and feeling, his songs express emotions related to separation and isolation, feelings that he may have experienced when he left the Stanley Brothers and moved from the South to work within the confines of a Detroit factory. Compared to mainstream music of 1956, Williams’ performances sound introspective and dark. Williams’ vocal begins low and hits the ceiling during the refrain of “You Ain’t No Good For Me.” The song presents a dialog between a man and a woman (all sung by Williams), with her defiant response to his menacing verses sung as the high part in the refrain.
Second verse:
If you don’t want a lickin’ better sit right down,
Stop that lookin’ at me with that fra-ha-hown
Refrain:
[low] Baby
[high] I-I-I-I don’t wanna
[low] Baby, you ain’t no good for me [7]
Listen to the entire song here.
While his Fortune disk received little attention, the Clix record fared worse. However, it represents an imaginative exploration of rock’s combinatorial possibilities, being one of the first mixed-race rock’n’roll sessions in town. A black vocal group backed Williams and his bluegrass vocal style, along with saxophone, drums, electric guitar, bass, and piano. [8]
One song, “She’s Gone,” features a danceable, uptempo beat, but Williams begins with a startling wail of despair. The refrain ends with, “I’ll never see my darling / She left me all alone.” [9] Listen to the song here.
The flip side, “Baby, Baby, Baby” is a slow blues with a desperate, pleading delivery by Williams trying to convince his woman to return to him. He sings softly, but with a nervous energy that sounds barely contained.
From here to yonder
After the sortie into rock’n’roll, Williams continued building Cadillac cars and picking bluegrass. Then his life took another abrupt turn: “My health got real bad and a preacher came to visit me at the hospital there, in River Rouge. He invited me to come to his church. I told him I didn’t have good enough clothes. He said, ‘You don’t have to worry about that. Just come on.’ I went to his church and gloriously got saved. From that I started writing songs, and went from here to yonder,” said Williams.
Williams listened regularly to country disk jockey and musician Red Ellis on WHRV radio Ann Arbor. One afternoon Ellis aired a Stanley Brothers record on which Williams had played mandolin, so Williams gave him a call. Soon after, the two men teamed up to play and write religious music. From 1958 to 1961, they performed all over Southeast Michigan. With Ford Nix on banjo and Bob Stiltner on bass (who Williams met during his time with the Stanley Brothers), the group recorded more than 30 songs for Starday Records, issued on several extended-play singles and two albums. They also cut singles for local labels such as Pathway, and Happy Hearts.
Williams said he “tore the sheet with brother Ellis” in 1961, and moved back to Bluefield. “I felt the callin’ to go out and preach,” he said. He started a group called Jimmy Williams and the Shady Valley Boys at WHIS radio. From there, he began his evangelistic work. Eventually Williams moved his family to Florida, but he returned to Michigan and cut a couple of high-energy bluegrass gospel albums with Ellis in the early 1970s for Jessup Records of Jackson, Michigan.
By now, Williams’ solo efforts for Fortune and Clix have reached the ears of rock’n’roll and rockabilly music fans around the world. While those records seemed full of raw, emotional yearnings for better times, Jimmy Lee Williams spent his later life communicating spiritual joy with a contagious fervor in his performances, which he kept up until his passing in 2012.
********************************************
Notes
- Jimmy Lee Williams interviewed by Keith Cady in 2002.
- Paul Williams interviewed by Keith Cady in 2002. After the Williams Brothers episode, Paul Humphrey was known as Paul Williams for the rest of his career.
- Bill Napier moved to Detroit in 1954 and played mandolin with Curly Dan Holcomb (he later formed an act with his wife: Curly Dan and Wilma Ann) while working in the auto industry. Williams suggested that Napier try out for the Stanley Brothers band, and four months after his first audition, Napier joined them for a spell that lasted until 1960. He went on to work with several others, including Charlie Moore during the 1960s. Napier died in 2000.
- In a 2001 interview, Buster Turner told Keith Cady about playing bluegrass music in Detroit. “We had an electric guitar added in, to play a little more country … slow dancing. Up there [in Detroit], you couldn’t hardly get a job in a bar where they had dancing, if you played bluegrass. But if you had an electric guitar … you could play a little slower music like ‘Tennessee Waltz’ and stuff. That’s the way it was back then, with bluegrass.”
- “Now let me tell you where rockabilly comes from. It comes from the cotton patch blues, and from bluegrass.” Charlie Feathers quoted by Ben Sandmel from his liner notes to the “Charlie Feathers” Elektra Nonesuch (American Explorers) 9 61147-2, 1991 compact disc.
- “Variety Key In New Crop Of R&R Tunes” Teen Life (Oct. 19, 1956) 3. Nolan Strong was the lead singer of a Detroit-based rhythm and blues vocal group called the Diablos, who also recorded for Fortune Records.
- “You Ain’t No Good For Me” (Jimmy Williams) Trianon Publications (Fortune 191, 1956)
- Detroit-based record collector Cappy Wortman once speculated that Williams’ Clix sides were made at the Fortune Records studio with the Five Dollars vocal group.
- “She’s Gone” (Jimmy Williams) True Tone Publishing (Clix 100, 1957)
- Bond, Marilyn, and S. R. Boland. The Birth of the Detroit Sound: 1940-1964. Charleston, SC: Arcadia, 2002.
In 1993 Bear Family Records assembled all of Jimmy Work’s records in a double compact disc package, including his earliest efforts made in Detroit for the Trophy and Alben labels. Work also cut all of his Dot records (1954 to 1956) in Detroit. Liner notes author Rich Kienzle and Bear Family’s Richard Weize made some very good guesses at the personnel on these sessions.
From personal conversations with Jimmy Work, as well as a timeline of Casey Clark’s Lazy Ranch Boys assembled from interviews with various members of the band, I’ve pieced together some information that’s probably as close to the truth as a body can get without being there. This information concerns just Work’s activities in Detroit, as I don’t have anything to add to his better documented Decca, Bullet, London, and Capitol sessions. Work’s story appears in the book “Detroit Country Music – Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
1945, unknown studio, Detroit, Michigan
Trophy T14 “Those Kentucky Bluegrass Hills” backed with “You’re Gone, I Won’t Forget”
Trophy T15 “Rainy Rainy Blues” b/w “Heart That Steamboat Whistle Blow”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Dorris Woodruff: electric guitar
Autumn 1948, unknown studio, Detroit, Michigan
Alben 501 “Tennessee Border” b/w “Your Jealous Heart Is Broken Now”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Dorris Woodruff: electric guitar; unknown: rhythm guitar; unknown: bass
Listen to: Jimmy Work & his Border Boys – Tennessee Border
Circa August 1954, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1221 “Making Believe” b/w “Just Like Downtown”
Dot 1245 “That’s What Makes The Jukebox Play” b/w “Don’t Give Me A Reason To Wonder Why”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Buddy Emmons: steel guitar; Chuck Carroll: electric guitar
Ca. August 1955, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1267 “Don’t Knock, Just Come On In” b/w “Let ‘Em Talk”
Dot 1277 “My Old Stomping Ground” (paired with “Hands Away From My Heart”)
Unissued “Blind Heart”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Terry Bethel: steel guitar; Donnel Hemminger: electric guitar
Ca. September 1955, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1272 “There’s Only One You” b/w “When She Said You All”
Dot 1277 “Hands Away From My Heart” (paired with “My Old Stomping Ground”)
Unissued “Puttin’ On The Dog (Tom Cattin’ Around)”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Jimmy Murrah: steel guitar; Donnell Hemminger: electric guitar
Ca. February 1956, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1279 “Rock Island Line” b/w “That’s The Way It’s Gonna Be”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: possibly bass; Dick McCobb: piano; Donnel Hemminger: electric guitar; Ted Bay: drums
Ca. April 1956, United Sound Systems, Detroit, Michigan
Dot 1284 “You’ve Got A Heart Like A Merry-Go-Round” b/w “Blind Heart”
Dot 1287 “That Cold, Cold Look In Your Eye” b/w “Digging My Own Grave”
Jimmy Work: vocal/guitar; Casey Clark: fiddle; Bronson Reynolds: bass; Billy Cooper: steel guitar; Donnel Hemminger: electric guitar
A long line of men dressed in rugged suits filed past iron gates on Manchester Street in Highland Park, Michigan, as they did every morning, into the Ford Motor Company facility. One by one, they flashed their Ford badges at the guard stationed in a small shack. Outside the gate, a 15 year-old boy stood near the shack, hands in his trouser pockets, chatting with the uniformed man inside, who interrupted the conversation every so often to check someone’s identification.
“I brought ya some apples,” the young man said with a Tennessee drawl, and handed a paper sack to the guard, who gave one apple back. After sharing a snack together, the young man asked, “Say, what are my chances today? Like I said before, I’m ready to work at anything.”
The guard tolerated his daily appearances, eventually warming up to his friendly personality and persistence. It was obvious the young man, who showed up at the morning whistle every day, intended to stay in Detroit. “Well,” said the guard while keeping his eye on workers entering the property, “There’s a small opening in the fence about sixty feet east of here. It may be wide enough for you to slip through. I reckon I can’t stop you, if I don’t see you.” He took his eyes off the shuffling plant workers long enough to look the kid in the eyes and say, “I know you won’t cause me no trouble.”
“No, sir!” The wide-eyed young man continued chewing apple.
“I just happen to know a foreman who’s looking for a welder,” said the guard. “If you get in, look up Fred Walker.” The young man thanked the guard, who nodded, too preoccupied to look up. Then he strode east to the gap in the fence, slipped through, and secured a position at Ford.
Working man, day and night
Trained on the job as a welder, Forest Rye had grown up in Erin, Tennessee, west of Nashville. Born December 19, 1910, Rye learned to play fiddle and guitar before he left home in 1924. When Rye was a small boy, champion fiddler Walter Warden, from McEwen, Tennessee, and an early influence on Fiddlin’ Arthur Smith, schooled him in music. Warden lived up the road from the Rye household, and thought so highly of Rye that he gave him a fiddle. When Rye came to Detroit, he found a room in a boarding house, and doggedly spent about a week talking his way into Ford’s Highland Park facility. [1]
A pioneer country music bandleader in Detroit, Rye entertained at house parties through the 1930s, eventually leading groups of musicians in local cafes and bars. In 1937 he married, and moved back to Erin, where he started a grocery with his savings. He visited friends in Detroit occasionally, and in 1939, Rye returned to Detroit, where he found work at Chrysler’s facilities on the east side of town.
The area surrounding Chrysler, at East Jefferson Avenue near St. Jean, included neighborhoods of white Southerners who had moved for work in local factories. In this environment, Rye’s Red River Blue Yodelers, gigged steadily at the Torch Club on East Jefferson. Around 1941, Rye made a record for Universal Recording Studios, which was just a few blocks away from the Torch Club. “Snake Bite Blues,” in which Rye yodeled in the style of Jimmie Rodgers, backed with “Don’t Come Crying Around Me Mama” was probably the last record on the Detroit Universal label before the men behind the business changed from Universal to the Mellow Record Company. Both sides of the record were dominated by Hawaiian steel guitar, and neither included a fiddle. Vocals were attributed to “Conrad Brooks,” a fake name Rye used on the record — perhaps to avoid public association with the hot blues lyrics.
Listen to: Rye’s Red River Blue Yodlers – You Had Time To Think It Over
In early 1942, the band recorded “You Had Time Think It Over” backed with “On Down The Line” for the Mellow Record Company, and the tracks were pressed on the Hot Wax label (with Mellow catalog number 1616 — it was pressed on Mellow, too). Vocals on the Hot Wax label were also attributed to “Conrad Brooks.” The band included Rye’s fiddle, Hawaiian (lap) steel, bass, and rhythm guitar.
Little Willie Rye
Rye’s stage show included humor, and as early as 1942 he was making appearances on the WSM Nashville radio’s “Grand Ole Opry” as comedian Little Willie Rye. This made him the first Detroiter to perform with the “Opry.” Many Detroit musicians would follow Rye’s path, beginning with the York Brothers after World War II. Not to mention a few musicians who moved to Detroit after first performing at the “Opry” (e.g., Fiddlin’ Arthur Smith, Okie Jones, and Chick Stripling).
Rye moved back to Tennessee in 1945 and married again. He returned to Detroit in 1947, hiring into Ford’s Rouge plant as his family began to grow. Soon after this move to Michigan, Rye secured a gig at WXYZ radio with his Sage Brush Ranch Boys, a band that included bassist Earl “Shorty Frog” Allen, who led his own band in Detroit several years later. [2]
Listen to: Rye’s Red River Blue Yodlers – On Down The Line
For a couple of years during the late 1940s, Mountain Red appeared with Rye’s Sage Brush Ranch Boys in Pontiac area nightclubs as a featured singer. Red also appeared with Rye on WXYZ, when he wasn’t performing his solo programs at WCAR radio Pontiac.
Rye often let other musicians sit in with his band in Detroit nightclubs. Joyce Songer recalled performing with the Sage Bruch Ranch Boys several times, when she and husband Earl started their musical career, around 1949. [3]
Rye maintained ties to Nashville, including relationships at WSM with announcer George D. Hay and many performers. Singer Pete Pyle, a 1940s recording artist (Bluebird label) and one-time member of the Bill Monroe and Pee Wee King bands, was a fast friend, eventually moving next door to Rye’s house in Taylor, Michigan. They appeared together in local nightclubs, such as the West Fort Tavern on West Fort Street in Southwest Detroit. In 1953, Rye and Pyle cut sessions for Fortune Records. Rye’s “Wildcat Boogie” and Pyle’s “Are You Making A Fool of Me?” were combined on a single record (Fortune 172). [4]
In 1955 Rye and Pyle moved their families back to Tennessee. As Little Willie Rye, Rye worked on Nashville radio as a solo comedian, and with the band of Big Jeff Bess. He wrote songs, operated a song publishing company (Geraldine), produced and made his own recordings [5], and issued music on his own record label (Forest), besides playing music in studios and on stages. He also booked acts for WSM radio and Nashville area venues. In 1967 Rye left behind his activities in country music to become a Christian preacher. He passed away April 24, 1988.
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Notes
- Linda Rye Austin interviewed by Craig Maki in 2012-13.
- Shorty Frog cut his own record at the Fortune studio on 3rd Street in Detroit around 1958 (“Sheddin’ Tears Over You” b/w “I’m Glad You Didn’t Say Goodbye” by Shorty Frog and his Space Cats, Hi-Q 12).
- Joyce (Songer) Singo interviewed by Craig Maki in 2008. Singo’s story appears in the forthcoming book “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies” from University of Michigan Press.
- Steel guitarist Chuck Hatfield and guitarist Al Allen played on Pyle’s session.
- For example, in 1960 Little Willie Rye and the Old Timers made “Road Of Happiness” b/w “Make Believe Girl” for Pace Records (1007).
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.”
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.
In 1934, twelve-year-old Victor Lewis left school and his home in east Tennessee. Eventually he found his way to Detroit, where he realized his passion in the theater and entertainment business. He first got hooked in burlesque theaters. “I was spellbound by the magic of the pitchmen,” he said. “I thought if I could do that I would never want for anything.” [1]
In 1958, Lewis produced the Hank Williams Memorial Show, a national tour featuring Audrey Williams, widow of Hank Sr., which also included appearances by young Hank Jr. Detroit bandleader Eddie Jackson and his Swingsters opened for Ms. Williams during the Michigan leg of her tour. Lewis included talent contests for audience participation. Winners received free tickets to events he booked at Ford Auditorium and the Hazel Park horse racing track.
In 1959, Lewis brought his Country Music Hit Parade Jamboree to Detroit. Not only does the official program book include an amazing photograph of the cast (see below) with Michigan Governor G. Mennen “Soapy” Williams, but the insides include early promotionals of Brenda Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Donny Young, a.k.a. Johnny Paycheck. The book described the photo as taken during the intermission of a “recent Michigan engagement.” Lewis signed Detroit banjo picker Ford Nix to accompany Stonewall Jackson when Jackson returned to the region for another tour.
Grady Moss, Harlan Dodge, Earl Scruggs, Lester Flatt, Brenda Lee, Webb Pierce, Pete Drake, Eddie Crandall, Carl Perkins, Michigan Gov. G. Mennen Williams. Kneeling, from left: Red Mason, Slim Vaughn, Dale Potter, Cousin Elmer, Pearce Bradley, Smiley Temple, Victor Lewis (Producer), Eugene Stapleton (Manager), and Jack Ihrie (WEXL Disc Jockey). Correction: Thanks to musician and Lester Flatt/Earl Scruggs fanatic Mitch Manns, who reports the two gentlemen immediately to Scruggs’ left are Paul Warren (left) and Curly Seckler. I copied the names from an original book and had no clue of the error, until Mitch pointed it out. – Craig Maki
By the early 1960s, Lewis moved his office to Nashville. In May 1964 he produced the National Country Music Cavalcade of Stars, a country music variety show at Madison Square Garden in New York City, complete with closed circuit TV coverage. (This also featured Hank Williams Jr.)
He researched his next project by tapping Detroit film producer Victor Duncan for advice about making movies. In 1964 Lewis and Audrey Williams went into business together with Marathon Pictures, Inc. and Lewis issued “Country Music On Broadway,” the first of a series of movies featuring country music stars. Others included “Second Fiddle To A Steel Guitar” (1965) and “Sing A Song For Heaven’s Sake” (1966). Marathon was one of the first film companies based in Nashville.
Lewis retired during the 1980s. He passed away in 2008. [2]
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Notes
- Crile Bevington Jr. “‘Power of Positive Thinking’ Is True Belief Of Nashville Producer” The Times — Tri-Cities Daily (Florence, Sheffield, Tuscumbia, Muscle Shoals, Alabama. September 24, 1967. Vol. 108, No. 177), 17.
- “Victor Lewis, 86, died Nov. 13.” http://www.musicrow.com/2009/01/nashville-related-music-obituaries-2008/
It’ll be down-to-earth music the boys will want, and there’ll be longing in the hearts of everyone for the simple, restful melodies of our land. – Smilin’ Red Maxedon [1]
Born August 31, 1910, and originally from Illinois, Maxedon spent some of his youth in Wisconsin and Washington State. [2] Surrounded by a family that included six brothers and four sisters who played guitar, fiddle, and banjo, Maxedon performed at community functions for many years, before leaving home during his teens.
He first broadcast over KFLV radio Rockford, Illinois, northwest of Chicago. From there, he breezed into the Windy City – first at WCFL radio, and then at clear channel WLS, home of the “National Barn Dance” Saturday night jamboree. Maxedon specialized in western songs, inspired by early singing cowboy stars who appeared on the “National Barn Dance” such as Gene Autry, Eddie Dean, Rube Tronson, and Max Terhune. A left-handed musician, Maxedon taught himself to play left- or right-handed guitar and often switched mid-performance for his audience.
Mountain Pete’s Mountaineers
By 1940 the Mountaineers performed daily over WJBK radio Detroit, and every night at restaurants and showcases. Maxedon’s brother Roy, ten years his junior, visited him for a couple of weeks around that time. [4]
“Me and John worked at some tavern in some suburb there. … South of the Border was the name of the tavern. We played there … must have been every night. … We just went around, table to table, singin’. We didn’t have a band or anything. We’d do requests,” he said. [5]
Maxedon, his wife, and their two young boys lived in an apartment downtown. On Thanksgiving Day, 1941, the red headed baritone joined WJR staff with a fifteen-minute solo program that aired mornings at quarter-past five. (Mountain Pete and his Mountaineers remained at WJBK.) By fall 1944, Maxedon also sang with long-time WJR favorites Tim Doolittle and his Pine Center Gang over the radio, three times a week. [6] Perhaps the first folk music singer in Detroit radio, Doolittle had performed on WJR since 1924, when the station’s call letters were WCX. [7]
Listen to: Smilin’ Red Maxedon – I Fell In Love (Arcadia AO-600)
Goodwill Frolic
In October 1944, WJR “the Goodwill Station” introduced “The Goodwill-Billies,” another early morning program. Along with several musicians recently arrived from the South, Maxedon performed Monday through Saturday from five to six o’clock. The group included vocalist Ernie Lee, Bronson “Barefoot Brownie” Reynolds on bass, steel guitarist Jerry Byrd, and fiddler Casey Clark. Lee, Reynolds and Byrd came directly from the Renfro Valley show in Kentucky. Clark moved from WIBC radio Indianapolis, Indiana. WIBC vocal duo the Blue Mountain Girls also joined the show. [8]
In 1945, the Goodwill-Billies started a Saturday night program called the “Goodwill Frolic,” adding “Pee Wee” Linden on accordion. While working with the Goodwill-Billies, Maxedon created a female alter ego, Melba, who appeared in comedy routines with Reynolds’ female alter ego, Barefoot Bonnie.
The Goodwill-Billies proved a popular draw to radio listeners and for personal appearances at fairs and showcases across Michigan. When WJR ended the show in September 1946, Ernie Lee left Detroit for Cincinnati’s WLW radio and its “Midwestern Hayride” Saturday night barn dance. Reynolds and Byrd joined Red Foley’s Cumberland Valley Boys at the “Grand Ole Opry” at WSM radio Nashville, and Clark retired back home to Kentucky. (Clark returned to Michigan the following year.) Maxedon, who began making records for the Arcadia company of Detroit in 1946, returned to WJBK radio.
Next week in part two: Red Maxedon’s recordings, and we answer the question, “What ever happened to Smilin’ Red?”
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Notes
- “John ‘Smilin’ Red’ Maxedon” Mountain Broadcast and Prairie Recorder (September 1944. New Series, No. 1) 23. “The boys” refers to active U.S. soldiers.
- Ibid.
- “Detroit’s WXYZ Wins Showmanship Award” LIFE (December 27, 1937. Vol. 3, No. 26) 50. Original photo cutline read: The WXYZ Mountaineers are heard from coast to coast. No hillbillies, they are city-bred musicians. Director Pete Angel (left) is a former concert violinist, was born in France. His mates hail from Canada, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Russia.
- Mountain Broadcast and Prairie Recorder (September 1940. Vol. 2, No. 1) 11. Maxedon’s early career was documented in a letter he wrote to the magazine.
- Roy “Smiley” Maxedon interviewed by Keith Cady in 2001.“American Folk Tunes” Billboard (Sept. 20, 1947. Vol. 59, No. 37) 121. Mountain Pete’s brother Al played bass. World War II broke up the band, but according to the September 20, 1947, edition of Billboard, “Mountain Pete and His Country Cousins returned to WJBK, Detroit, September 15, and are heard five times weekly …” Band included guitarist, clarinet/saxophone player, accordionist, pianist and vocalist.
- See note 1.
- “American Folk Tunes” Billboard (September 2, 1944. Vol. 56, No. 36) 62. After his original group broke up in 1942 (due to the draft), Tim Doolittle’s Pine Center Gang in 1944 included Al Sager, bass, organ (for hymns) and fifteen other instruments; Paul Henneberger and Joe Pullin, fiddles; Pete Baltrusz, accordion; and vocalist Dottie Leader.
- A more complete story of the WJR Goodwill-Billies appears in the book “Detroit Country Music: Mountaineers, Cowboys, and Rockabillies.”
No doubt, the future of the legendary United Sound Systems recording studio on 2nd Avenue in Detroit is in question. Click here for the building’s history. The Michigan Department of Transportation, or MDOT, is moving forward with plans to upgrade the Interstate 94 expressway, and the United Sound Systems building appears to be in the way of the expansion.
A few weeks ago, I attended a meeting of the Detroit Sound Conservancy and the current owners of the United Sound Systems building showed up. Members of the Detroit Sound Conservancy are working with MDOT and the owners of United Sound Systems to save one of the oldest recording studios in the country.
A conundrum
People who knew Jimmy Siracuse, the founder of United Sound Systems, have said Siracuse opened a studio during the 1930s (1933 is often cited as the year). My conundrum: While spending two decades researching the early history of Detroit country music, I was hard pressed to find evidence of records made by United Sound Systems during the 1930s.
The Great Depression killed off most independent record companies, and it wasn’t until the York Brothers’ “Hamtramck Mama” of 1939 that country records began appearing on Detroit-based labels. From what I could tell, these were made for the jukebox business. “Hamtramck Mama” first appeared on the Universal label, cut at Universal Recording Studios on the east side (miles away from the Second Avenue building of United Sound Systems). The Universal record label issued records for only a few years, during the late 1930s and early 1940s.
Exhibit A
While digging around the Internet, I found a forum where former Detroit audio engineer Bob Olhsson stated Jimmy Siracuse and his family “operated a music store and recording studio during the 1930s.” Olhsson told of Siracuse’s army service at the Paramount studios in Queens, New York, during World War II. When he returned to Detroit, Siracuse set up United Sound Systems on 2nd Avenue, in a district of advertising agencies near the General Motors building on Grand Boulevard.
Exhibit B
I recently found two 78rpm records with United Sound Systems labels that I had never examined before. They represent the oldest labels I’ve seen, and appear to date from the 1940s. One is a custom-recorded disk of two children singing songs for their daddy. The other is music performed by an organist who worked at Detroit’s famous Arena Gardens roller skating rink.
Note the striking similarities of the early United Sound Systems record labels to the Universal Recording Studios above. From the label border to the lettering across top and bottom, to the hand-drawn label names and the small circles above them that sport initials of the studios, they appear to be the work of the same designer.
Was Jimmy Siracuse involved in Universal Recording Studios, whose activities began during the late 1930s? Universal updated its label design around 1941 (by the same designer, it appeared). Also in 1941, the Detroit Free Press published “Award made by F.P. poet,” (Dec. 30, p. 3) which mentioned a recording studio at the United Sound Systems address (5840 Second).
Verdict: Confused
I have often heard people mix up the names of the two studios. Perhaps I’m the one who’s confused, after all. I suspect that if Siracuse had anything to do with Universal, it was during that studio’s earliest days, before Siracuse established his own enterprise. On the other hand, with no documentation to be found, one could easily assume that Siracuse had nothing to do with Detroit’s Universal studio, and the record label designs were the only things they had “in common.” Perhaps a Detroit-based printer with an in-house artist had a monopoly on record label work; or the company that pressed the records themselves provided custom-designed labels to anyone who wished to manufacture records.
From the time she started singing in public, Patti Lynn’s vocal abilities and charm attracted the support of Detroit musicians and bandleaders such as Ford Nix, Eddie Jackson, Billy Martin, and Frankie Meadows. Click here to see Part One of the story of her music career.
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Lynn met her first husband when she performed at a Detroit car dealership. “He said, ‘I know a guy you gotta meet. His name is Eddie Jackson — a good friend of mine.’ He took me over to where Eddie was playing and he told Eddie, ‘You gotta listen to this girl sing.’ (You know, acting like a typical salesman.) … I started working with Eddie. Those were probably some of the best years of my life, ’cause Eddie was a great guy with an excellent sense of humor. And he just always had a good crowd around him. He was a lot of fun to work for.” [1]
According to Lynn, Jackson and his band worked forty-five minutes on stage and took fifteen-minute breaks all night long. Lynn sang three or four songs per set, and mingled with the crowd.
We used to jam a lot. We’d start Saturday night, after the bar closed, and we might be jammin’ come Monday morning. I can remember one club I worked where some of the musicians were … in the back room, on cases of beer taking a nap! [laughs]
“Back then, we used to party a lot after we got off work at the bar,” said Lynn. “And some of the parties would go all weekend. My ex-husband had a way of saying, ‘I’m gonna go to the store and I’ll be back in a few minutes,’ and he might show up three days later. He was always running into somebody he knew, so he’d keep on partying. One time he called me and said, ‘Honey, put me on a steak. I’m on my way home.’ And he called me three days later from Chicago! I can remember looking at Eddie saying, ‘Same old room, same old window, same old blues!’”
Lynn’s comment about the “same old blues” caught Jackson’s ear and he wrote “Blues I Can’t Hide.” “I’d write a line here and put away the sheet of paper until the next time something hit me,” said Jackson. It took a while to complete, but when it was done, he and his band the Swingsters cut it for the B-side of their Detroit hit “I’m Learning” in 1963. [2]
Same Old Blues
In 1964 Lynn’s husband set up a session for her at Fortune Records. “Oddly enough, [he] used to date Skeeter Davis. So he knew of this place [the Fortune studio], and of course Eddie knew of it,” she said. “They put their heads together and decided that’s where I ought to go to cut this record. They kind of made the arrangements. I was so green, I had no idea what was going on. I’d never been to a recording studio in my life.
“It was just a little home studio. I think that they were getting a good sound in there, compared to some of the other studios I’ve cut in since — even much higher-tech studios. I’m really amazed at the sound quality they got in there. I think Devora [a.k.a. Dorothy] Brown was onto something,” she said.
At the Fortune studio, Lynn sang as piano, steel, and guitar expertly traded solos. “Same Old Blues” backed with “One Faded Rose” was pressed on Fortune subsidiary label Hi-Q (no. 23). A disk jockey at WEXL started spinning the record, and Lynn said it reached the top of the station’s country music charts. “I was totally surprised that the record was being played,” she said. Lynn’s dissatisfaction with her vocal performances kept her from promoting the record, and it ran its course within a year.
Lynn soon joined Frankie Meadows and his band at the Wayside Bowling Lounge in Hazel Park. Lynn worked with Meadows when she cut “Don’t Hang Around My Door” b/w “The Mirror Behind The Bar” for the Glenn label (no. 3450). [3] She also sang a dab on other Glenn singles, including Frankie Meadows’ “Six Steps” (Glenn 3001) and WEXL disk jockey Jim Mitchell’s “Fillin’ In” (Glenn 3400).
Listen to: Don’t Hang Around My Door – Patti Lynn
Meadows and the band appeared on WKBD-TV Channel 50 every Saturday, around that time. “A lot of things were happening back then,” said Lynn. “We started playing bills with ‘Opry’ acts in town. We were busy. After that, a fella by the name of Paul Wade started booking me and I started doing some tours down in Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio. I was on the road for a while.”
Don’t Hang Around My Door
Lynn divorced her husband and moved out West. When she returned to the Detroit area a few years later, she changed her stage name to Kelly Roberts. “After I moved back to Michigan, … an old friend looked me up. Buddy Childers had been in the business back when I was Patti Lynn. I met him when I started. He came over and told me, ‘You need to get back in the business.’ And I said, ‘No, no, no.’ He kept after me,” said Lynn. “We’d go out and do benefits and jamborees with guys like Jimmy Williams. … All the musicians would go to jamborees and jam all day. Practically every Sunday afternoon there would be a big jamboree going on someplace.
“In the seventies, I started working with Roy Sparks who bought the Moon Supper Club and turned it into Nashville North. … Another local group, Country’s Pride, was hired to play there, too. Debbie Grosse of the band had an opportunity to work with Charlie Louvin, so she left Country’s Pride and the guys got a-hold of me. I worked with them for quite a while,” she said.
She remarried, and formed a band called Kelly and Country with two old friends, Chuck Neely and Jay Preston. While Lynn held down a full-time job, the group worked nightly. “[After] I moved out to Clarkston, I was coming home from Port Huron every night, six nights a week — and I had to be at my job at seven in the morning — I was so tired, I ran off the road,” she said. “I was about an inch from a big sign on the expressway, and I thought, ‘I either have to get into the business and stay in it, or work a job. I can’t run on three hour’s sleep at night.’ … Jay moved to Tennessee, and I continued with my day job. I slid back, away from the music business, and that’s where I am today. I miss it. It’s never far from my mind.”
Lynn continued to sit in with friends once in a while.After retiring from her job, she bred Ragdoll show cats. “I’m at the point where it’s all nice memories,” she said.
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Notes
- Patti Lynn interviewed by Craig Maki in 1995
- Eddie Jackson interviewed by Craig Maki in 1995, 1996.
- Mona Kerry of Shreveport, Louisiana, cut “Don’t Hang Around My Door,” also for the Glenn label (Glenn 1501).
