Johnny Horton

Although he is better-remembered for his historical songs, Johnny Horton was one of the best and most popular honky tonk singers of the late 1950s. Horton managed to infuse honky tonk with an urgent rockabilly underpinning. Although his career was cut short by a fatal car crash in 1960, his music reverberated throughout the next three decades. Horton was born in Los Angeles in 1925, the son of sharecropping parents. During his childhood, his family continually moved between California and Texas, in an attempt to find work. His mother taught him how to play guitar at the age of 11. Horton graduated from high school in 1944 and attended a Methodist seminary with the intent of joining a ministry. After a short while, he left the seminary and began traveling across the country, eventually moving to Alaska in 1949 to become a fisherman. While he was in Alaska, he began writing songs in earnest.