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About the Author
I have been a country music fan all my life. I began listening to country music while growing up on my parent’s farm in Northeast Oklahoma during the ‘60s. At an early age, I listened to Bob Wills, Red Foley, Hank Thompson and Ernest Tubb, among others on a tiny Motorola transistor radio. I could pull in stations as far away as WLS, Chicago or Del Rio, Texas. In high school while my classmates listened to Bobby Darin and the Beatles, I discovered Webb Pierce, Carl Smith, Buck Owens, Wynn Stewart and Merle Haggard. Back then I thought that country music was the only music that existed. I still do. Well isn't it?

As my interest grew in the music, I started buying records. For nearly three decades, I have compiled a collection of 4,000 albums and 1,000 compact disc. Each time I discovered an artist or learned more of the genre, it fueled more interest. However, I found detailed and comprehensive information difficult to obtain.

The writing of these web pages manifested out of frustration from the lack of adequate information available. My love of country music and passion to learn more of its roots, pioneers and, legends, fueled my motivation for this task. I've been further influenced and inspired from a deep desire to help in some small way in the preservation of Original Country Music in all its diversity. Only after many years of diligent research, listening and collecting, did I feel astute enough to carry out this project. Since I am determined to be factual, precise, candid and comprehensive, some of this work has been more than five years in the making. I hope you have as much fun reading these pages as I did writing them.

Richard J. Bell

back Revised: 12/19/1999 | Thanks for visiting!