20 Country Legends Who Died Before Their Time
Conway Twitty (1933-1993): Conway Twitty broke through with the rock 'n' roll smash, It's Only Make Believe. In 1965, he switched to country music, later charting hits such as Hello Darlin', Fifteen Years Ago and Tight Fittin' Jeans. During his career, Conway made history by having more No. 1 hits than any artist in country music. Conway was inducted into the Country Music Hall of fame in 1999. Conway became ill after a show in Branson, Missouri and died of an abdominal aneurysm at the age of 59.
Marty Robbins (1925-1982): Marty racked up a string of hits with Singing The Blues and Devil Woman. In May of 1982, Marty was in the Top-10 with Some Memories Just Won't Die. In October of that year, Billboard recognized him with the Artist Resurgence Award. Then, just seven weeks before he passed, he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. The El Paso storytelling legend died of heart failure at the age of 57.
Eddie Rabbitt (1941-1998): Rabbitt started his career writing Kentucky Rain for Elvis and Pure Love for Ronnie Milsap. Soon, he was singing his own smash hits, Two Dollars In the Jukebox and Drivin' My Life Away. Consistently recording and touring in the final stages of his life, Eddie kept his battle with lung cancer private. As a matter of fact, only a few immediate family members even knew of his passing until the funeral was over. Eddie was 56 at the time of his death.
Tammy Wynette (1942-1998): Tammy was known as the First Lady of Country Music and her best-known song, Stand by Your Man, was one of the biggest selling hit singles by a woman in the history of the country music genre. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, she dominated the country charts, scoring 17 number one hits. Along with Loretta Lynn and Dolly Parton, she defined the role of female country vocalists in the 1970s. Wynette, who had many serious ailments died while sleeping on her couch at age 55.
Cowboy Copas (1913-1963): A popular honky-tonk singer of the fifties, Copas made a stunning comeback in 1960 after an eight year gap in his chart activity. He achieved national fame when he replaced Eddy Arnold as a vocalist in Pee Wee King's Golden West Cowboys band (1943). Copas had the third biggest song in country music in 1960, when he dominated the airwaves that year with his No. 1 single, Alabam. Cowboy died at age 50.
Jim Reeves (1923-1964): Between 1953 and 1964, Reeves placed 46 songs on the Billboard charts. More impressively, his widow, Mary, worked with RCA Records to keep his music alive and he racked up 33 posthumous hits, including the No. 1 songs Distant Drums and Blue Side of Lonesome. The crooner of He'll Have to Go was piloting his own plane when crashed outside Nashville and he died at age 40. Jim was inducted into the Country Music Hall of fame in 1967.
Hawkshaw Hawkins (1923-1963): On March 2, 1963, Lonesome 7-7303 was released and it quickly soared to the top of Billboard's country charts. Grand Ole Opry star, Hawkshaw Hawkins posthumously attained his long sought after No. 1 song. He should be recognized for his pure natural talent, instead of a passenger on an ill-fated plane crash that took the life of Patsy Cline and Cowboy Copas. Hawkins died at age 40.
Keith Whitley (1954-1989): Whitley's career was on the rise when he died of alcohol poisoning. At the time, Whitley was enjoying his third No. 1 single with I'm No Stranger to the Rain, ironically a song about overcoming depression and alcoholism. Whitley was just three years into a marriage with country singer Lorrie Morgan when he died at age 33.
Patsy Cline (1932-1963): Patsy Cline only had 9 songs on the Billboard country charts before her death in a plane crash at age 30. Like Jim Reeves, Cline's music lived on with several chart entries after her death, including Sweet Dreams and Always. Patsy was inducted into the Country Music Hall of fame in 1973.
Hank Williams (1923-1953): Hank Williams is regarded as one of the most important country music artists of all-time. However, it seemed like no one at the time would realize the impact his songwriting and singing would have on American music in the years to follow. In the period from 1947 until his death, Williams recorded 35 singles that placed in the Billboard Top-10, including eleven that ranked number one. The lethal combination of alcohol and prescribed drugs ended his life at age 29. Hank was inducted into the Country Music Hall of fame in 1961.
Gary Stewart (1944-2003): Stewart’s debut album, Out of Hand (1974) was a formidable deadpan triumph, but by the end of the 1970s Gary had fallen victim to some of the vices he documented in his tough honky-tonk hits like Drinking Thing, She's Acting Single and Out of Hand. On December 16, his daughter's boyfriend and Stewart's very close friend went to Gary's home to check on his welfare. They found Stewart dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the neck. He was 59.
Dottie West (1932-1991): Country Singer Dottie West was one of the most gifted and talented pioneers of modern country music. West was one of a few female country singers, performing in a genre which was then dominated by male singers. On August 30, 1991, Dottie was scheduled to perform at the Grand Ole Opry. Shortly after leaving her Nashville apartment, her car stalled near her home. Her elderly neighbor spotted her on the side of the road and offered to drive her to the Opry. He lost control of his vehicle while exiting near the Opry at an excessive speed. The car left the ramp, vaulted in the air and hit the central division. West later died on the operating table at age 59.
Wynn Stewart (1934-1985): Wynn Stewart was among country music's most magnificent entertainers to come out of the West Coast circuit. He made superb music during his heyday of the 50's and 60'. His music influenced both Merle Haggard and Buck Owens, yet his success never paralleled theirs. It was partly own fault. Not a driving personality and never a business person, Stewart was plagued by drinking and motivational problems that directly affected his career. Wynn died from a heart attack at age 51.
Warren Smith (1932-1980): Warren took up the guitar while in the US Air Force and afyer his discharge, he moved to West Memphis, Arkansas. There he auditioned, successfully, to play the Cotton Club, a local hot spot. Steel guitarist Stan Kessler spotted Smith's potential and took him to Memphis' famed Sun Records to audition for Sam Phillips. Phillips liked what he heard and decided to add him to the Sun label. Smith continued to record with several labels, but with little success. In 1980, while preparing for a European tour, Smith died of a heart attack at age 47.
Jack Anglin (1916-1963): Jack was a country music singer best known as a member of The Anglin Brothers and later Johnnie & Jack with Johnnie Wright. Driving alone to attend a memorial service for Patsy Cline not far from his home, he rounded a bend in Madison, Tennessee at a high speed and died in the ensuing crash at age 46.
Mel Street (1935-1978): Mel Street debuted on the charts in 1972 with Borrowed Angel. Street continued to flourish throughout the mid-1970s, recording several hits. Suffering from clinical depression and alcoholism, he died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, on his 43rd birthday. His single, Just Hangin' On, entered the country charts the very day he died. The song title turned out to be sadly prophetic.
Bob Luman (1937-1978): Luman was a country and rockabilly singer who rose to fame in 1960 with Let’s Think About Living. Bob toured frequently in the 60s and 70s and became popular in Las Vegas, with an act which combined country and rockabilly. Bob died of pneumonia at age 40.
Johnny Horton (1925-1960): Of all the singers who broadened the country music landscape in the '50s, Horton is probably the least known. Johnny, who made his name as a honky-tonk singer with strong rockabilly tendencies, skyrocketed to fame in 1959, with his recording of The Battle of New Orleans. Johnny died in a car crash near Cameron, Texas at age 36.
Don Rich (1941-1974): Don Rich helped develop the Bakersfield sound in the early 1960s. Rich was Buck Owens' lead guitarist, harmonizer and fiddle player and leader of Owens' back-up band the Buckaroos. On July 17, 1974, after an evening in the studio, Don rode his motorcycle toward Morro Bay, California, where he planned to join his wife and their two sons on a fishing trip. Somewhere near San Luis Obispo he crashed his motorcycle and died at age 32.
Little Wendy Holcombe (1963-1987): Little Wendy Holcombe was a teenage musician and fledgling bluegrass music star when she came into the spotlight. She had blond pigtails, a red checkered baby doll dress and bounced up and down when she played the Banjo. Her enormous talent catapulted her to the very top of the entertainment world, but due to an enlarged heart she died of heart failure at age 24.
Writtebn by: Richard Bell, Country Music Historian: Nashville,Tennessee,USA. Sep., 2011
