Celebrating Johnny Cash’s 86th birthday
This Monday, February 26 would have been Johnny Cash’s 86th birthday. Many books have written, movies have been made, and songs have been sung about “The Man in Black.” Recently, I saw an exhibit at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, depicting Cash’s late 1960s career revival. It was the time of “Folsom Prison Blues,” “A Boy Named Sue” and his ABC variety show. Cash took country music to the masses, spotlighting lesser-known artists who would soon become household names.
His career was a rollercoaster ride, for sure. He hit it big in the 1950s, but not like his friend Elvis Presley. The hit musical “Million Dollar Quartet” re-enacts a Sun Records jam session that included Cash, Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins. Once word got around, everybody wanted to be a fly on that wall.
After early success, Cash’s career came tumbling down. Most of those who have written about his life blame his downfall on a combination of booze, women and pills. The quality of his recordings declined, and his once-solid stage show became erratic.
What finally pulled Cash out of his drugriddled lifestyle was the result of a traffic crash in Walker County, Georgia on November 2, 1967. Cash drove his Cadillac Eldorado into the woods. After banging on doors like a wild man, he was locked up in the jail in Lafayette. The next morning Sheriff Ralph Jones opened the cell door and handed his pills back to him. The Sheriff said to Cash, “God has given you free will. You can go ahead and keep doing this. But when I told my wife you were here, she cried all night. She’s a big fan of yours, she loves you so much. I’m going to let you go, but I never want to see you back here like this. You can either kill yourself, or save your life.”
Cash forever gave credit to Sheriff Jones for that wakeup call. Friends say his courtship of June Carter, of country music’s royal Carter family, also helped turn him around. Scandalous at first, the relationship blossomed into a long, happy marriage, and more than a few great duets.
Cash’s died on September 12, 2003. He had been in failing health for a number of years. He hadn’t toured since 1997 due to complications from diabetes and a neurodegenerative disease that robbed him of his strong voice and sure hands. June had helped care for him, and watched over him like a mother hen. While he was recording his final albums, it was June who made sure that her ailing husband wasn’t overdoing it. He needed something to
AARP/ VITA volunteers will help with federal and Georgia income tax preparation
Feb. 6, 2018,
— by appointment only —at the LaFayette branch of the
Cherokee Regional Library.
Appointments can be made by calling 706-375-2451 during the day, Monday, Thursday and Friday. Appointments will also be made on Tuesday’s at the Library with the AARP volunteers for the balance of the tax season.
COMMUNITY ·
Rossville Community Ministries,
a ministry of Rossville area churches, is a
stocked with nonperishable food to help families or individuals in the Rossville area. Non-perishable food items, cash donations and volunteers are needed. The Rossville Community Ministries is open Mondays and Thursdays from noon until 3 p.m. They are at South Rossville Baptist Church, 101 East Peachtree Street. Those coming for the first time should call 706-866-3888 during office hours to find out what is necessary to avail themselves of this service.
pantry
food
do, but not more than he could physically handle.
That’s why the real shocker involving the Cash family occurred a few months earlier, on May 15, 2003. June was in the hospital for heart-valve replacement surgery. With Johnny’s health problems getting so much attention, June’s condition had received little notice. There were complications, and June died following surgery. Press reports say Johnny was in a wheelchair at his wife’s funeral, “looking somber and frail.” It was generally believed he was fading anyway, but June’s sudden death surely accelerated his decline.
If you’ve ever seen his final video, you know how unforgettable it was. Whether intentional or not, it served as a farewell gift for his many fans. It was filmed in Cash’s Hendersonville home in October 2002. By this time, he was unable to walk, and legally blind. You see the once-strapping man, unsteady and trembling, contrasted with photos and videos from his hell-raising younger days. When it was released in February 2003, the scene that choked me up was when June was looking at her sick husband, with a mixture of love and concern. Upon her sudden death, the video took on added poignancy. As is often the case in life, the caretaker did not survive the patient.
As we remember his words and music, here’s a sweet birthday note he wrote for June in 1994:
“We get old and get used to each other. We think alike. We read each other’s minds. We know what the other wants without asking. Sometimes we irritate each other a little bit. Maybe sometimes take each other for granted.
But once in a while, I meditate on it and realize how lucky I am to share my life with the greatest woman I ever met. You still fascinate and inspire me. You influence me for the better. You’re the object of my desire, the #1 Earthly reason for my existence. I love you very much.
Happy Birthday Princess.
John
David Carroll, a Chattanooga news anchor, is the author of “Chattanooga Radio and Television” and “Volunteer Bama Dawg,” a collection of his best stories. Books are available at ChattanoogaRadioTV. com, or by sending $23 each to David Carroll Book, 900 Whitehall Road, Chattanooga, TN 37405. You may contact David at 3dc@epbfi.com.