Johnny Cash USAF 1954
 

Hey, Porter

Recorded March 22, 1955 by Johnny Cash

I wrote "Hey Porter" when I was coming home from the Air Force, July, 1954. My excitement about coming back to Dixie was just about as alive as it appears in the song, and the first time I ever heard my voice on the radio, it was "Hey Porter".

-JRC/1970

"Actually the first thing we recorded at Sun Records was Folsom Prison Blues. Sam Phillips liked it very much, but he wanted to hear something else so I did a song I wrote called Hey Porter that I had written on the way home from Germany when I was discharged from the Air Force. And it was kind of a day dreamin' kind of thing. I used a train as a vehicle in my mind to take me back home and counting off the miles and the hours and minutes till I would get back home. It wasn't to Tennessee though, it was to Arkansas, Dyess, Arkansas where my parents were still living at the time. Hey Porter was recorded and Sam said, 'What else have you written?' I said, 'Well, like I've told you before a lot of gospel songs you know.' I had called him initially saying I'm John Cash-I'm a gospel singer and I want to record gospel. And he said, 'I can't sell enough gospel to stay in business.' He said, 'We got to have something commercial and call me back when you have something commercial.' Well I kept calling back. He was always out or busy and I finally got the appointment and went in with Marshall Grant and Luther Perkins-The Tennessee Two. We had a steel guitar player working with us, but he was afraid to go in the recording studio and I guess maybe it was lucky for us that he didn't because The Tennessee Two came up with a sound that was kinda unique. I think a steel guitar would've taken us more toward Nashville than what was happening up there, so we recorded Hey Porter."

-JRC1980

Nice one... didn't know that.

My favorite great-uncle's name was Porter.

I didn't know that fact either till I looked it up the other day. When I first heard the song title years ago I thought Johnny was singing about Porter Wagner who was from West Plains, Mo :D

Dunno if I've ever said so to you, but I'm from Mizzou myself, born and raised in Joplin... so Porter Wagner was kind of a regional hero to some of us. Loved those jackets he wore, and his hair-do was kinda special too :D

What town in the Ozarks , I was born in Rolla and raised in Salem,Mo . BTW did you know that Shannon Miller Age: 19 From: Edmonton, OK was born in Rolla ,Missouri too :D As an Olympic Gold Medalist she is more famous then our Late Senator Mel Carnahan (elected while being dead!) Who was also Governor of Mo. While alive (LOL)

It was Joplin... on a dairy farm. From about 1890 or so we used to have three big dairy farms there, one at Reddings Mill area, one on the west side of town on the road to Miami, and the one I stayed on in Duenweg (about 4 miles east of Joplin). The farms on the west and in Duenweg are ruins now, turned into subdivisions. My family has lived in that region (all the way from Springdale, ARK, to Galena, KAN to Tallequah, OKL) since the mid 1800s... so, I'm related one way or another to about 10% of the folks within that radius :D

A good part of one branch of our family still own all that land, several homesteads and the one big farm at Reddings Mill, though we don't do any dairy on it anymore... the barns and stuff are still there. Its kinda funny riding down NN hwy and seeing my family names on all those mailboxes. They named the main blacktop drag through Duenweg after another family branch, Porter's side, because he had been Mayor and Fire Chief and all. We built two Churches of Christ (old school) one in 1870 down at Beef Branch, near Reddings Mill creek, and one called Stapleton in Joplin when there got to be too many of us at BB... that's where a good many of the old family are buried in the churchyard.

I remember Rolla very well. On my way from Chicago, after service, my first trip to California to finish college in LA, the VW Beetle I was driving blew the engine right outside of Rolla. It took them two days to put a rebuilt one in ($400 at the time), during which time I slept in the car.

Joplin is a historically Famous City!
 

So your ancestors were involved in the Mo/KS border war too! (lots of Bushwackers from the sw corner of Mo.)

Did ya' know that Jaime McMurray who drives the #42 Texaco Car in Nascar is from Joplin too :D

Then there is one of my Favorite Actors Dennis Weaver also from Joplin !

Then of course there is the Pony Express National Museum in Joplin too.

This year has been the biggest year for Drivers from Missouri in the Cup Series of Nascar the three Wallace brothers Rusty,Mike,and Kenny (St.Louis), Ken Schrader (Fenton,MO), Carl Edwards (Columbia,Mo) and Jaime McMurray (Joplin,Mo) the new Magnificent Seven :ae: when I started watching Nascar the biggest gang of Drivers were known as the Alabama Gang :D Rusty finished 3rd at Dover and moved up to 2nd in the Points ,My family is hoping that Rusty retires with his Second Nascar Championship that would be something to see celebrated at Homestead this fall.

My mother's only sister, Elizabeth, is married into the Comer clan in Joplin. About 50 years ago her husband started a towing service with one rickety truck, and now it has grown into an empire fleet of his, plus both of his sons each have their own fleets, and three body shops, and one of them races dirt track modifieds in the area. Anyway, I mention this because they got pretty excited when one of the homeboys. McMurray, started getting some NASCAR attention.

Bob Cummings and Mickey Mantle were also from Joplin.

Yep, McMurray has indeed gotten a load of attention. He is going after 11th place again for the Million dollars :)

Chuck Norris was is also an Air Force Veteran.