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Cash was a musician who was not tied to a single genre. He recorded songs that could be considered rock and roll, blues, rockabilly, folk, and gospel, and exerted an influence on each of those genres. Learn 50 facts from life and career of Johnny Cash.
1. Born Feb. 26, 1932, in Kingsland, Ark., Johnny Cash was born John R. Cash.
2. He was one of seven children belonging to Ray and Carrie Rivers Cash.
3. When John was 3 years old, his father took advantage of a new Roosevelt farm program and moved his young family to Dyess Colony in northeast Arkansas. There the Cash family farmed 20 acres of cotton and other seasonal crops.
4. Young John worked alongside his parents and siblings in the fields.
5. Music was an integral part of everyday life in the Cash household.
6. John soaked up a variety of musical influences ranging from his mother's folk songs and hymns to the work songs from the fields and nearby railroad yards.
7. As a young man he set off for Detroit in search of work. He ended up in Pontiac, Mich., and took work in an automotive plant.
8. His tenure in the North Country was short-lived and Cash soon enlisted in the U.S. Air Force.
9. After basic training in Texas (where he met first wife Vivian Liberto), he was shipped to Landsberg, Germany.
10. While in the service Cash organized his first band, the Landsberg Barbarians.
11. After his discharge in 1954, Cash returned stateside and married Liberto.
12. He and his new bride soon settled in Memphis where Cash worked a variety of jobs -- including that of appliance salesman -- while trying to break into the music business.
13. In 1954, Cash auditioned as solo artist for Sam Phillips' Sun Records. He entertained hopes of recording gospel music for the label, but Phillips immediately nixed that idea.
14. By the following spring, though, Cash was in the Sun Studios to record with his band The Tennessee Three. The original group consisted of guitarist Luther Perkins, bass player Marshall Grant and Red Kernodle on pedal steel. Kernodle bailed out of the session and Cash's first release for the label, "Hey Porter" had a sparse, but highly effective instrumental accompaniment. Though an impressive single, the song failed to chart.
15. Cash's follow-up release for Sun, however, fared substantially better. "Cry, Cry, Cry" managed to crack Billboard's Top 20, peaking at No. 14. A long succession of chart singles followed. "So Doggone Lonesome" and "Folsom Prison Blues" both broke into the trade publication's Top 10.
16. But Cash's fourth chart single proved to be his career song. "I Walk the Line" shot to Billboard's No. 1 position and remained on the record charts for an incredible 43 weeks, ultimately selling over 2 million copies.
17. In 1956, he realized a longtime dream when he was invited to perform on the Grand Ole Opry.
18. By 1957 Cash had racked up an impressive string of hits and was working more than 200 dates a year.
19. The following year he switched to Columbia Records in search of more artistic freedom. He still had aspirations of making gospel records and felt he had a better chance of accomplishing this goal at another label.
20. Throughout the remainder of the 1950s and into the 1960s, Cash continued to produce remarkable records and charted consistently. "Don't Take Your Guns to Town," "I Got Stripes," "Ring of Fire," "Understand Your Man" and "The Ballad of Ira Hayes" all hit the upper registers of the record charts.
21. In the early 1960s, concept albums such as Bitter Tears and Ballads of the True West made him a favorite among the folk music crowd, culminating in an appearance at the Newport Folk Festival.
22. His marriage was collapsing and divorce seemed inevitable. Too, his grueling tour schedule (which was now up to 300 shows a year) had taken its toll. Cash became dependent on narcotics to keep up the hectic pace. By the mid-1960s, Cash was a deeply addicted and it began to impact hiscareer.
23. By 1967, though, Cash managed to overcome his addiction with the help of his singing partner June Carter and her family.
24. In 1968, he and Carter were married and his career experienced a renaissance.
25. Throughout the remainder of the decade and into the 1970s, Cash was at the top of his game. A pair of live recordings made at Folsom Prison and San Quentin both went gold and a passel of awards followed including the Country Music Association's Entertainer of the Year and Male Vocalist awards in 1969.
26. The final payoff though, was a network television spot. Premiering in 1969, The Johnny Cash Show aired on ABC. Taped at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium, the show featured an eclectic mix of guests ranging from Bob Dylan and Neil Young to Louis Armstrong and Merle Haggard.
27. In 1980, at the age of 48, Johnny Cash became the youngest living inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
28. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame bestowed its honor on him in 1995, thus making him one of a handful of country artists in both organizations.
29. In 1985, Cash joined friends Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson to form The Highwaymen. The supergroup released three albums between 1985 and 1995, scoring a No. 1 hit with the single "Highwayman" from their first album, The Highwaymen.
30. Although battling serious health problems in the late 1990s, Cash entered a professional renaissance after signing with rap producer Rick Rubin's American record label.
31. American Recordings, released in 1994, won a Grammy for best contemporary folk album.
32. The follow-up, 1996's Unchained, earned the Grammy for best country album in 1997.
33. His 2000 release American III: Solitary Man, included a cover of Neil Diamond's "Solitary Man," which won Cash a Grammy for best male country vocal performance in 2001.
34. In 2002, Cash released American IV: The Man Comes Around which included the Nine Inch Nails single "Hurt." Cash earned three CMA awards in 2003, and the acclaimed video for "Hurt" won an MTV award and a Grammy.
35. After losing his wife June Carter Cash unexpectedly in May 2003, Johnny Cash passed away Sept. 12, 2003 at Baptist Hospital in Nashville, Tenn. from complications from diabetes.
36. In 2005, a film version of his early romance with Carter, titled Walk the Line, was
37. Oscar-nominated for Best Picture.
38. A single-disc compilation titled The Legend of Johnny Cash was also released in 2005 and went on to sell more than two million.
39. Johnny Cash and June Carter had seven children between them; Carlene Carter, Rosanne Cash, Rosey Carter, Kathleen Cash, Cindy Cash, Tara Cash and John Carter Cash.
40. Cash researched his heritage and found a mix of mostly Scottish and English ancestry.
41. Cash was raised by his parents in the Southern Baptist faith tradition. He was baptized in 1944 in the Tyronza River as a member of the Central Baptist Church of Dyess, Arkansas.
42. Cash is credited with converting actor and singer John Schneider to Christianity.
43. In recognition of his lifelong support of SOS Children's Villages, his family invited friends and fans to donate to the Johnny Cash Memorial Fund in his memory. He had a personal link with the SOS village in Diessen, at the Ammersee Lake in Southern Germany, near where he was stationed as a G.I, and with the SOS village in Barrett Town, by Montego Bay, near his holiday home in Jamaica.
44. In 1999, Cash received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
45. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked Cash No. 31 on their "100 Greatest Artists of All Time" list.
46. The main street in Hendersonville, Tennessee, Highway 31E, is known as "Johnny Cash Parkway".
47. A limited-edition Forever stamp honoring Cash went on sale June 5, 2013. The stamp features a promotional picture of Cash taken around the 1963 release of "Ring of Fire: The Best of Johnny Cash."
48. Country singer Mark Collie portrayed Cash in John Lloyd Miller's award-winning 1999 short film, I Still Miss Someone.
49. In November 2005, Walk the Line, a biographical film about Cash's life, was released in the United States to considerable commercial success and critical acclaim.
50. Cash was a musician who was not tied to a single genre. He recorded songs that could be considered rock and roll, blues, rockabilly, folk, and gospel, and exerted an influence on each of those genres.
Source: johnnycash.com, Wikipedia.org
