ROOTS of Country Music

The Joseph Lee Frank Story

(Apr. 15, 1900 ~ May 4, 1952)

When Joe Frank was named to the Country Music Hall of fame in 1967, his was not a familiar name. Although he was Pee Wee King's father-in-law, it wasn't the reason he got inducted. Alabama native Joseph L. Frank was the first major promoter and manager on the country music scene in Nashville, Tennessee.

 Born in Mount Rozell, Alabama (AL) Frank grew up in Giles County, Tennessee (TN), near the Alabama border. His mother died when he was two and his father died when Joe was seven. Joe worked in the steel mills of Birmingham as a young man before moving to the coal mines of Illinois. Life's outlook was rather dismal.

At age twenty-three, Frank had enough of that life and headed for Chicago, where he eventually became a booking agent for radio stars Fibber McGee and Molly, Gene Autry and other popular entertainers of the day. During the mid-1930s, Frank relocated his base of operation to Louisville, Kentucky, briefly promoting Autry before the singing cowboy's move to Hollywood.

Frank also booked such acts as fiddler Clayton McMichen and Frankie More and His Log Cabin Boys, a country act that included Frank's son-in-law, future Grand Ole Opry star and Tennessee Waltz songwriter, Pee Wee King. In 1935 Pee Wee met a girl named Lydia Frank who had been singing over Louisville radio. Her father was Joe Frank. Pee Wee liked Joe but liked his daughter even more and in 1936 he married her.

King also gained the services of Frank as the band's new manager. When King went out on his own Frank continued promoting Pee Wee around Knoxville, Tennessee and the surrounding region. In 1937, Frank helped secure King and his band, the Golden West Cowboys, a coveted spot on the Grand Ole Opry. By this time, Frank had already met country singer Roy Acuff while working in the Knoxville area. In addition to helping Acuff follow King's example on the Opry in 1938, Frank suggested that Acuff change his band's name from the Crazy Tennesseans to the nobler-sounding Smoky Mountain Boys.

 Frank's talents as a promoter included determination as well as a professional sense of showmanship. He was instrumental in elevating Opry acts from small-town theaters and schools to the larger big-city auditoriums, and he promoted the early careers of such future country music superstars as Eddy Arnold, Ernest Tubb and Minnie Pearl.

Frank's detailed and thorough behind-the-scenes work was every bit as significant to their success as the sold-out package shows he organized. Frank was a star-maker, a builder. Generous to a fault, he lent a helping hand to many young musicians, not only in business matters but also in personal ones. Frank helped people who later became industry giants. He fed and clothed many and loaned money to others. A newspaper columnist, in 1945, called Frank "the booking bazooka of the southeast."

As a songwriter, Frank wrote the country music standard Chapel on the Hill as well as Sundown and Sorrow and My Main Trail is Yet to Come. At the peak of his career, Frank grew ill during a business trip to Chicago in 1952 and died at the age of 52. It was fifteen years later when the Country Music Hall of Fame honored him, a "pioneer promoter," the first promoter, thus honored.

During the Country Music Hall of Fame ceremonies in October, 1967, Mrs. Frank, widow of Joe L. Frank, stood at the podium flanked by Pee Wee King, Ernest Tubb and Tex Ritter, weeping while accepting her late husband's hall of fame plaque. Mrs. Frank said, "Everybody loved J.L. and he knew his business." Joe Frank also was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of fame in 1989.

Researched and written by: Richard Bell, Country Music Historian, Roots of Country Music, Nashville, Tennessee, USA. April 2011