Massachusetts-native Yodeling Slim Clark died on Wednesday night, July 5, 2000, in St. Albans, ME. Born Raymond L. Clark at Springfield in 1917, he was just fourteen when he first sang for the public in 1932. Around that time or certainly not much later, after hearing a Montana Slim national radio broadcast, he became a cowboy singer. "A cowboy," he said, "is anyone who lives that type of life, no matter where he is."
Clark first sang on the radio in Massachusetts; and in 1938, he started more than a decade of performances on WKNE in New Hampshire, including a memorable weekly show with legendary Keene announcer, Ozzie Wade. Later, he moved to Maine, where he starred in the 1960s on the Bangor radio program, "RFD Dinnerbell."
At one time, Clark was in a group, the Red River Rangers, with Kenny Roberts. Later, he led his own band, the Trailriders, with a young Dick Curless on rhythm guitar. But mostly it was just Slim, singing and strumming his old guitar over alternating bass notes and short, often emphatic runs.
"I used to be a country-western singer," he once said, "until they went ... [pause] ... somewhere else. So I went back to where I started."
Clark made his first 78 RPM recording in 1946 for Continental. Other records followed on Wheeling, Arc, and Palomino. He lived to sell his tapes on the Internet; and not long ago, he released his first CD.
An avid sports fan, Clark once tried out as a pitcher for the Boston Braves.
Late in life, Clark was still entertaining at fairs and bluegrass festivals. Few country singers anywhere have performed for so long.
Clark won the World Yodeling Championship in 1947. He has been honored by several state country-music associations. And he is represented in the Walkway of Stars at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville. Yodeling Slim Clark will be inducted -- posthumously now -- into the Cowboy Hall of Fame in November. -- Alan Lewis, 8/8/2000
Worth having:
Don Cleary. Yodeling Slim Clark Discography.
Web site:
www.crosslink.net/~bigmack9/slimcrk.htm
A short version of this article was published in the 8/14/2000 issue of the old Boston Rock and Roll Museum Newsletter.
Copyright © 2000 by Alan Lewis. All rights reserved.
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