Honoring Johnny Cash
defined as a gathering where songwriters would play their latest tunes for each other. Silverstein, best known for his children’s books, reportedly had two inspirations for his song. A friend who happened to be a fellow entertainer was a man named Jean, and Silverstein was familiar with Jean’s frustrations of having a female name. But the song’s actual namesake is believed to be Tennessee’s own Sue Hicks, a well-known legal figure who had first made a name for himself in 1925 at the Scopes Trial in Dayton, Tennessee. He was on the prosecution team, led by William Jennings Bryan. Hicks later served as a Circuit Court Judge in Tennessee for 22 years. During his career, he tried over 800 murder cases and thousands of others, but admitted he was best known for his unusual first name. Unlike the tortured “Sue” in the hit song, Judge Hicks said he had a good relationship with his father, who bestowed the name upon him in honor of his mother Susanna, who died shortly after Sue was born. Judge Sue Hicks died in 1980 in Sweetwater, Tenn. at the age of 84.
Unlike most hit records of that era, “A Boy Named Sue” had a very loose, unrehearsed feel to it. It certainly wasn’t overproduced. If it sounds like the musicians were making it up as they went along, that isn’t too far from the truth. On the live album version, you can hear Johnny ask guitarist Carl Perkins to hang around for another song or two (including “Sue.”) Sure enough Carl had been given the lyrics only a few hours before, and was asked to “put some chords to this.” Johnny himself didn’t know the words. He had never performed the song in front of a microphone. If his reactions, and those of the audience sound real and spontaneous, it’s because they’re all hearing Sue’s story for the very first time!
“I busted a chair right across his teeth, and we crashed through the wall and into the street, kicking and a’ gouging in the mud and the blood and the beer.”
This not-so-friendly father and son reunion, “in Gatlinburg, in mid-July” sure paints a picture, doesn’t it? Shel Silverstein was awfully good at that, selling 14 million books and writing more hit songs, including “Cover of the Rolling Stone” and “Sylvia’s Mother” for Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show. “Sue” was the big one though, winning Silverstein a Grammy for Best Country Song, and Cash for Best Male Vocal Performance (1969). It peaked at #2 on the charts, kept out of the top position by “Honky Tonk Women” by the Rolling Stones.
What did Judge Sue Hicks get from all this additional notoriety? Good ol’ Johnny sent him a couple of personally autographed photos: “To Sue, how do you do?”
Of course Judge Hicks is long gone, Silverstein died in 1999, and Johnny left us in 2003. To borrow a line, I never met ‘em before they died, but if I could, I’d thank them for “the gravel in your guts and the spit in your eye,” and I’d thank June for talking Johnny into performing that song. As usual, she steered him in the right direction.
David Carroll, a Chattanooga news anchor, is the author of the new book “Volunteer Bama Dawg,” a collection of his best stories, available at ChattanoogaRadioTV. com, or by sending $23 to David Carroll Book, PO Box 15185, Chattanooga, Tenn. 37415. You may contact David at 3dc@epbfi.com.