Merle Haggard, considered one of the greatest country-music artists in history, died today after a long series of health problems, according to his manager. He was 79. Today also was his birthday.
We’ll let other music writers tell about Haggard’s considerable legacy, which is far deeper than “Mama Tried” and “Okie from Muskogee.” (His one-man revival of Bob Wills and western swing made a huge impact, as just one example)
But it should be known that although Haggard was born in Bakersfield, California, the Oklahoma roots of his mother and father never were far from his mind, nor the U.S. Highway 66 that brought them to California.
In fact, Haggard’s story figured prominently in the National Museum of American History’s “America on the Move” exhibit.
In the 1930s, drought and falling crop prices drove thousands of rural midwestern families to leave their farms and follow Route 66 to California to find work. James F. and Flossie Haggard left Oklahoma in 1935 after a fire destroyed their barn and its contents. The Haggards and their children, Lillian and James Lowell, made their home near Bakersfield, and James found work with the Santa Fe Railway. Another son, Merle, was born in Bakersfield and began his singing career there. By the 1960s Merle Haggard was a country music legend.
“Mama and Daddy were making it on a 40-acre farm they had leased…. [After the fire] it was all gone. The barn, the wagon, the plows, the cows, the horses, and Daddy’s prized Model A Ford. He set out to town on foot to get himself another car…. He came back home with a ’26 Chevy and a little homemade trailer bumping along behind. They gave up the lease on the 40 acres, loaded what belongings they had in the trailer, and headed west toward California.”
For all practical purposes, the Haggards was among the thousands of Okies who fled poverty and the Dust Bowl to go to California.
The Washington Post in 2003 reported on Haggard attending the “America on the Move” opening:
The event was acknowledging Haggard and his sister, Lillian Haggard Hoge, who donated an assortment of items from their childhood to an exhibition celebrating travel, “America on the Move,” opening in November. While the exhibit will feature many modes of travel, dating to 1876, a highlight will be the section on Route 66. […]
“I traveled Route 66 when I was 14,” Haggard told the gathering. “Left California and came east in search of what — I’m not sure. I hitchhiked Route 66, then went to Amarillo. My mother had no idea where I was. I was 14.” He sounded melancholy.
“There’s not a time,” he went on, “that I travel that I don’t think of my mother and father and how they traveled.”
Those tales of the Dust Bowl, the Great Depression and his Oklahoma roots never seemed far from his mind and popped up in several of his songs:
I once worked in the Internet department of a western-wear retailer and did a lot of social-media stuff. One of the most popular threads was when I asked, “If there was a Mount Rushmore for country music, whose faces would be on it?”
It inspired a few goofy answers but also lot of good ones … names you’d expect, such as Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton, George Strait, George Jones.
But the two most popular answers were Hank Williams and Merle Haggard.
(Image of Merle Haggard by TownePost Network via Flickr)