Remembering Roy Acuff

It was on September 15, 1903, that the "King of Country Music" Roy Acuff was born. Roy was born in Maynardville, Tennessee and grew up in the Knoxville area. He came to Nashville and joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1938. He would remain an Opry member until his death on November 23, 1992.

The Roy Acuff story has been told many times, including by myself, so instead of writing the usual biography, I thought I would do something different. I have a book called, "Grand Ole Opry" that was published in 1952. This small, hardcover book is about 70 pages and gives you a history of the Opry and short stories or biographies of the Opry's main performers. Here is what was written in this book about Roy Acuff. Just remember that it was written in 1952:

"As the Caruso of country singers, Roy Acuff has a larger and more loyal following than the great Enrico ever had. In eighteen years, his recordings of country songs have sold more than twenty-five million copies. American soldiers stationed in Europe voted him more popular than Frank Sinatra. And although he was not elected governor of Tennessee when he ran in 1948, more people are said to have listened to his campaign speeches than to those of any other candidate in the state's history.

In Washington's Constitution Hall, a capacity audience paid $6.60 top to hear a country music program staring Acuff. When he packed seventeen thousand shouting fans into Venice Pier in California, officials feared it would collapse.

In the center of the country music world, Nashville, Tennessee, Roy is really a king. He puts on five radio shows weekly on WSM, makes frequent television appearances, has a road company that makes as much as five thousand dollars a working night, operates one of the largest music publishing firms in the business in conjunction with songwriter, Fred Rose, and owns and operates a resort called Dunbar Cave, which includes a large lake, a $75,000 swimming pool, restaurant, dance floors, concessions, and a one-hundred room hotel.

Roy was born and brought up on a farm near Maynardville, Tennessee, in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains. His father, a preacher, and his mother played the fiddle and sang for their own enjoyment and relaxation. Roy thus learned to fiddle at an early age. He was a skillful baseball player and planned to play professional baseball, but a serious illness kept him from fulfilling a contract. After he recovered, he joined a medicine show. Later he played in a country band on two radio stations in Knoxville adn then organized his own band. He joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1938.

Roy sings serious songs, many of them religious in nature. He sings with shouting zeal and great emotion and so projects himself into the song that tears sometime roll down his cheeks from the sadness of the story. Many of the songs he wrote himself. Among the most popular of his records are 'The Great Speckled Bird', 'The Night Train to Memphis', and 'The Wabash Cannon Ball.'

Roy dresses in a modest plaid shirt adn slacks for most of his performances, prefering to appear in a garb that might be worn on any Tennessee farm or small-town street rather than adopt the fancy cowboy costume so many folk singers wear. He has a large collection of hand-painted neckties. Other members of his group, the jug band and the La Croix sisters, a vocal trio, dress in traditional mountain costume, with the comedian of the show in exaggerated hillbilly dress.

Roy is married. He and his wife, Mildred, have an eight-year-old son, Roy Neal."

I thought that little write-up on Roy covered it all.

In honor of what would have been Roy Acuff's 108th birthday, here is the Opry line up from Saturday October 17, 1992. The was the annual Opry birthday celebration and it would be Roy's last Saturday night appearance on the Opry (his final appearance was the following Friday, October 23). I, along with several others who read this blog, were at this show and you could sense that this might be the last time to see Roy. When Bill Anderson and Roy did the great song, "I Wonder if God Likes Country Music", there was a total hush in the Opry House and a prolonged standing ovation when they finished. There were also many tears in the Opry House that night. Bill wrote about the night in his book, "I Hope You're Living As High On The Hog As the Pig You Turned Out to Be." If you get a chance, read the story. It will move you as it did those of us who were there that night.

Saturday October 17, 1992:

First Show
6:30 GHS Strings
Bill Monroe (host)
Jim Ed Brown

6:45 Country Music Hall of Fame
Grandpa Jones (host)
Skeeter Davis
Roy Drusky

7:00 Shoney's
George Hamilton IV (host)
Jeanne Pruett
Mike Snider
The Osborne Brothers
Jean Shepard

7:30 Standard Candy
Porter Wagoner (host)
Shelly West
John Conlee

8:00 Martha White
Roy Acuff (host)
Connie Smith
Bill Anderson
Opry Squardance Band
The Melvin Sloan Dancers

8:30 Kraft
Hank Snow (host)
The 4 Guys
Jan Howard
The Carlisles
The Whites

Second Show:
9:30 Dollar General Stores
Porter Wagoner (host)
Wilma Lee Cooper
Stonewall Jackson
The Osborne Brothers
Mike Snider

10:00 Little Debbie Snack Cakes
Bill Monroe (host)
Roy Drusky
Jeannie Seely

10:15 Sunbeam Bread/Tennessee Pride
Roy Acuff (host)
Hank Locklin

10:45 Pet, Inc
Grandpa Jones (host)
Jean Shepard
Charlie Walker

10:45 B.C. Powder
George Hamilton IV (host)
Shelly West
Opry Squaredance Band
The Melvin Sloan Dancers

11:00 Coke
Hank Snow (host)
The 4 Guys
Connie Smith
John Conlee
Justin Tubb

11:30 Creamette
Jim Ed Brown (host)
Jan Howard
The Whites
The Carlisles
Johnny Russell

(I do have it in my notes that Hank Snow cancelled out for the night and the 4 Guys hosted. Not 100% on that one).

Thanks Mr. Acuff for the memories.