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By David Bowser MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Hiram "Hank" Williams began his career by winning first place in a talent show at the Empire Theater here in 1937. "He won $15 first place prize in the amateur talent show," says Beth Birtley, manager of the Hank Williams Museum on Commerce Street here. "He sang a tune that he wrote called 'WPA Blues.'" There's not a recording of it, so no one knows what the tune is, but the words are: "I have a home in Montgomery, A place I'd like to stay, But I have to work For the WPA." Hank Williams never had to work for the WPA, Birtley says. "Maybe he thought he would have to, and that's why he wrote the tune, but after winning $15, that was more than the WPA paid," Birtley says. "I guess he thought if he'd go back and win a talent show every so often, that'd be all he'd need." He did return to the talent show, and always won. "I think at one point, they even asked him to stop entering as a contestant so someone else would have a chance to win," Birtley says. Hank Williams was born Sept. 17, 1923, in the Mount Olive community, Butler County, Alabama. "It's about an hour's drive from here," Birtley says. He moved to Montgomery in 1937, when he was 13 years old. Hank spent his boyhood in Georgiana, Ala. "It's also in Butler County, near Mount Olive," Birtley says. "That's where they hold the Hank Williams Festival each year, the first weekend in June. We always have the New Year's Day celebration, because that's the day he died, and we have the birthday celebration in September." After Hank won his first talent show, he took a job at the radio station here in Montgomery on Moulton Street where the Jefferson Davis Hotel was. It was the tallest building in Montgomery, Birtley says, so that's where they put the radio station, WFSA. "He played on the radio every day for 15 minutes live," Birtley says. "That was before television, of course." He continued his radio show through the late 1930s and into the early 1940s. "He was a big entertainer on the radio," Birtley says. "People still tell us they looked forward to hearing Hank on the radio every day. I believe he played from 11:45 a.m. to noon, then he played again about 3:30 or 3:45 p.m." Some people have told her that they listened to him when they got home from school. Others said they listened to him in the morning. But Williams liked live audiences. "Hank was enjoying playing around the South Alabama school houses and community houses," Birtley says. "Anywhere he could play. Prior to that, he was shining shoes and selling peanuts out here on the street." But even when he was on the street, he was playing his guitar and taking lessons from a black street singer named "Teetot" Rufus Payne from Sandy Ridge in South Alabama. "Rufus Payne moved to Montgomery about the same time the Williams family did," Birtley says. Hank had taken lessons from Teetot in Greenville and Georgiana before they moved to Montgomery. "Teetot called him 'Little White Boss,'" Birtley says. "Teetot was in his 50s at the time." Williams met his wife Audrey in 1942. "They married Dec. 15, 1944," Birtley says. The Williams family, Hank's mother, the Skipper Family, and Audrey's family, the Shepherds, were all from South Alabama, Birtley says, and they still have family there. "Audrey inspired him to go to bigger places," Birtley adds. That took him first in 1948 to the Louisiana Hayride in Shreveport, La., then to the Grand Old Opry in 1949. "He got six encores the first time he sang at the Grand Old Opry," Birtley says. "He sang 'Lovesick Blues.'" Birtley says Williams became the biggest attraction the Grand Old Opry had ever seen. He appeared regularly there for a little more than three years. "He started recording in December 1946," Birtley says. "He recorded four records — eight songs on 78 records on the Sterling label." The four records, released in early 1947, are on display here at the museum. "They're very rare," Birtley says. "Three out of those eight songs were gospel songs," Birtley notes. "Move It On Over" was the first song he recorded on the MGM label after leaving Sterling, Birtley says. "Move It On Over," she contends, was the first rock and roll song. "It's very similar to the tune of 'Rock Around the Clock,' which was recorded in 1954," Birtley says. "Hank recorded his song in 1947." "Move It On Over" was Hank's first big hit on the MGM label. While his first professional debut was in Montgomery, Hank Williams’ final public performance was here also. "He attended a musicians’ union meeting," Birtley explains. "This was on Dec. 28, 1952, at the Elite (pronounced E-light) Cafe, which was over here on Montgomery Street." The Elite was a Montgomery landmark until it was shuttered in 1990. A new group of investors is planning to reopen it later this year. "It used to be Montgomery's finest restaurant," Birtley says. "It opened in 1911 and seated 650 people at one time. Hank used to go over there a lot, but there was a meeting that night, and they asked him to sing a few songs." Hank's last concert was a couple of weeks earlier at the Skyline in Austin, Texas. "But this was the last place that he sang in public," Birtley says of the informal Elite Cafe performance. "That night he sang a few songs. It was on a Sunday, and the next Sunday was his funeral." Hank Williams died on Thursday, Jan. 1, 1953. He was headed for Canton, Ohio, for a concert. "He didn't make it to Canton," Birtley says. "He died in Oakhill, West Virginia, at age 29." Hank had hired Charles Carr, 17, to drive his baby blue Cadillac convertible to Ohio for the show. Carr still lives in Montgomery. "He was a good friend of Hank's," Birtley says. Hank Williams’ career soared, but his personal life was at times troubled, though Birtley insists that stories of his drinking and drug abuse are exaggerated. "He put himself in rehab sometimes," Birtley says. "The Drifting Cowboys that are still alive today say he was not the falling-down drunk that he was portrayed to be." She says he would go eight or 10 months and not drink. "He was a binge drinker," Birtley explains. "Here at the museum, we concentrate more on the positive side of Hank. We don't like to hear a lot about his drinking and any drugs. I don't believe Hank died from an overdose. I think he probably had heart problems that weren't detected." He was on morphine, she concedes, because of back surgery he had had in 1951. "The doctors told him they couldn't help his spine," Birtley says. "It was a spinal defect from birth, and they placed him on morphine." He took morphine the whole year of 1952, she says. "It was to help his back and relieve the pain," Birtley says. "That could have contributed to his heart failure." Charles Carr says he wasn't drunk and didn't overdose at the time of his death. The death certificate says simply, "heart failure." "I never saw Hank take a drink the whole time I was working with him," says Jimmy Porter, who joined Hank's band, the Drifting Cowboys, in 1941. He says Hank did start drinking in 1951 because of his back problems. "He and Audrey were having real problems," Porter adds. "Jimmy was his youngest musician," Birtley says. "He was 13 years old when he started playing the steel guitar with Hank." "He was just an ordinary guy," Porter says. "He was a real humble person, and I enjoyed working with him." When Porter played with him, he grins, Williams wasn't a famous musician. "As a matter of fact, nobody in Montgomery really cared for him," Porter says. "Nobody in Montgomery liked country music then." Hank Williams and the Drifting Cowboys played mostly dances, Porter says, but they did some shows. Porter was in the car when Williams had the inspiration for "I Saw The Light." They were coming back one night from playing at Thigpen's Log Cabin in Georgiana, and Hank was in the back seat. It was about 1:30 a.m. Hank's mother was driving the car. "She always drove the car when we were on the road," Porter says. "All of a sudden, Hank says, 'I see the light.' What that meant was the searchlight at the airport." Porter says that when they saw the beacon at the airport on the south side of Montgomery, they knew they were almost home. "You could see it 10 or 15 miles out," Porter says. "Hank made a note of it. He didn't write the song that night, but he started working on it a few days later. It was recorded in 1947." Porter says Hank accepted Christ when he was about six or seven years old at the Mount Olive Baptist Church where his mother played the piano. "To write some of the songs he did, he had to know the Bible," Porter says. Porter played in Hank's band until the middle of 1944, when he left to join another band. "We remained friends," Porter says. Porter was with Hank in the early days, Birtley says, and he comes by the museum and helps give tours. Don Helms, one of the later band members, also comes by and helps with tours. "Don Helms is also a steel guitar player," she says. "He's playing steel guitar with Jett Williams’ band now." Jett Williams is Hank's daughter. She was born after his death. More than a dozen Drifting Cowboys who played with Hank Williams are still alive today. Over the years, the band naturally changed, so a number of musicians played with Williams. "He had many Drifting Cowboys," Birtley says. "From the early day, from the very beginning, the first one was 'Heavy.' His real name was Smith Adair. He was the first person who joined Hank to form a band after Hank won this talent show." Birtley's father, Cecil Jackson, is responsible for the museum. He had heard Hank Williams on WFSA radio and first met him when Hank was scheduled to sing at the Lightwood Schoolhouse in the early 1940s. "That's where my dad attended school," Birtley says. "My Daddy was eight years old when he saw a gathering of people across the street, across the highway, from where he lived. He went over to see what it was all about. He was barefoot and in overalls, a country boy." The crowd was around Hank. Audrey was with him, as was Lucretia, Audrey's little girl from a previous marriage. "Hank bought Daddy a Coke," Birtley says. "That was a treat for him back then." Hanks Williams hadn't begun recording yet, so he wasn't well known outside this area, but he was a celebrity in South Alabama. "When Daddy was 11 years-old, about the same thing happened," Birtley says. "Hank drove up to the Lightwood Schoolhouse." Hank had started recording by this time, but he still loved live audiences in South Alabama. "There was a flat tire on his Packard," Birtley says. "Daddy and a couple other of the boys got together and changed his tire." Later that night at the show, Hank dedicated a song to the Lightwood Flat Fixers. A few years later, her father was working at a tire station in Montgomery. "Hank lived at his mother's boarding house on McDonough Street, which is four blocks behind this building," Birtley says. "Hank drove the Cadillac, which we have on display, the 1952 baby blue Cadillac that he died in. He took it over to have the tires rotated and balanced. My Daddy helped do that." Her Dad drove the car back to the boarding house where Hank lived, then walked back to work. "Daddy said if he'd known Hank was going to die a week later, he'd have gotten his autograph," Birtley says. Her father began collecting and saving items connected with Hank Williams from then on. He saved all the newspaper clippings and records, anything having to do with Hank Williams. "He had a huge collection," Birtley says. "When I was a teenager, back in 1977, we were looking at some of his collection, and I asked my daddy, 'Why are you keeping all this old junk?' He said, 'They're going to go into my museum someday.'" But a prophet is rarely recognized in his hometown. "Montgomery just never recognized Hank except for the memorial here," Birtley says. "Daddy was always disappointed that Montgomery didn't have something." In 1997, her father formed the foundation that oversees the museum. "It took just a little over a year to prepare everything," Birtley says, "and get the museum open." The Hank Williams Museum opened on Feb. 8, 1999. "We just celebrated our fifth year," Birtley says. Cecil and Betty Jackson had five kids. Birtley was always the one who loved country music, and she adores her father. "Daddy always loved playing music," Birtley says. "My uncles and other people would come around and gather in the living room of somebody's house and play. I was always the one sitting inside and listening to them. Momma would always try to push me out the door to play with the other kids, but I always liked listening to the country music. I always loved country." Jackson has a Jumbo Gibson guitar that is an exact replica of the one Hank Williams played at the Grand Old Opry in 1949. "He bought that guitar the week I was born, in 1959," Birtley says. Jackson paid $75 for the guitar at a pawnshop. "That was a lot of money back then," she adds. "He still has it. It's in mint condition. He plays it all the time. He's played all my life." The Hank Williams Museum still serves country music. There is usually an old 78 on the phonograph up front, and the museum hosts jam sessions on the first and third Saturday night of each month. The Hank Williams Music Hall is on the second floor of the museum and the music — county-western, bluegrass, folk, gospel and hillbilly — begins at 6 p.m. There's usually a couple of dozen musicians, and the jam session is free. "Probably out of the three hours, we hear one or two songs an hour of Hank's," Birtley says. The musicians range from weekend aficionados to professional musicians. At the five-year anniversary of the museum this year, Jim Owens performed. "Jim Owens is an impersonator of Hank Williams," Birtley says. "He's played in Branson, Mo., for probably 15 years." There is always an open house the weekend nearest Feb. 8, the date the museum opened. There are also services on New Year's Day and on Sept. 17, Hank Williams' birthday. The New Year's Day services begin at 10 a.m. at Oakwood Cemetery, where Hank, Audrey and Hank's mother are buried. "Rain or shine, we're going to place flowers and do a memorial service for Hank and Audrey," Birtley says. "We also do his birthday, which is the weekend nearest Sept. 17." Even before the museum opened, Birtley's father and mother were involved in memorial services for the musician. "The bronze statue that's around the corner from us," Birtley says, "across the street from the old city auditorium — that's where Hank's funeral took place on Perry Street. It was the largest number of people to have ever gathered on the streets of Montgomery. There were 28,000 people. There were 2700 people in the auditorium." The statue was placed there on Hank's birthday in 1991. Her parents helped raise the money for the statue. Her father also got 55 miles of Interstate 65 designated the Lost Highway, named for one of Hank's songs. Hank Williams recorded 225 song in five years. He wrote 128 of them. "No other artist in any field of music has ever matched what Hank did in a five-year career," Birtley says, "and I don't think they ever will." He moved fast and died young, she says. "The preacher who preached Hank's funeral, Dr. Henry Lyon, didn't know if Hank's music would last a year or two years or forever," Birtley says, "but in his message, he said as long as there's America, there will be Hank Williams music to inspire it. Those are strong words." Henry Lyon's son still lives in Montgomery. "He's a dentist," Birtley says. "On the first, when we have the memorial, we've asked him to come and be a part of the service over at the statue. We do a candlelight vigil. He's recited the same message that his father recited." New Year's day is a big day here. After the 10 a.m. service at the statue, everyone returns to the museum for black-eyed peas and cornbread. "We go upstairs and have music," Birtley says. Then in the late afternoon, before dark, they go back to the statue and have a candlelight service. |
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