1. Michael Webb Pierce was an American country music vocalist, songwriter, and guitarist of the 1950s, one of the most popular of the genre, charting more number-one hits than any other country and western performer during the decade.
24 Facts About Webb Pierce
1. 2.
Webb Pierce's biggest hit was the honky-tonk-rooted "In the Jailhouse Now", which charted for 37 weeks in 1955,21 of them at number one.
3.
Webb Pierce was a one-time member of the Grand Ole Opry and was posthumously inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
4.
Webb Pierce began to play guitar before he was a teenager and at 15 was given his own weekly 15-minute show, Songs by Webb Pierce, on KMLB-AM in Monroe.
5.
Webb Pierce enlisted in the US Army Air Forces, and in 1942 he married Betty Jane Lewis.
6.
Webb Pierce moved to KWKH-AM and joined Louisiana Hayride during its first year, and devised a plan to achieve instant "stardom".
7.
Webb Pierce assembled and performed with a band of local Shreveport musicians, including pianist Floyd Cramer, guitarist-vocalist Faron Young, bassist Tillman Franks, and vocalists Teddy and Doyle Wilburn.
8.
Webb Pierce founded a record label, Pacemaker, and Ark-La-Tex Music, a publishing company, with Horace Logan, the director of the Hayride.
9.
On Pacemaker, Webb Pierce made several records between 1950 and 1951 designed to attract radio play around Louisiana.
10.
In 1951, Webb Pierce got out of his 4 Star contract and was quickly signed by Decca Records.
11.
Webb Pierce moved to Nashville, Tennessee, where he met and married his second wife, Audrey Greisham.
12.
In September 1952, the Grand Ole Opry needed to fill the vacancy left by the firing of Hank Williams, and Webb Pierce was invited to join the cast.
13.
Webb Pierce's singles spent 113 weeks at number one during the 1950s, when he charted 48 singles.
14.
Webb Pierce's 1954 recording of "Slowly" was one of the first country songs to include a pedal steel guitar.
15.
Webb Pierce made regular appearances on ABC-TV's Ozark Jubilee, including as a guest host once a month during 1956.
16.
On February 19,1957, Webb Pierce resigned from the Opry after he refused to pay commissions on bookings and for associated talent.
17.
Webb Pierce continued charting until 1982, with a total of 96 hits, and he toured extensively and appeared in the films Buffalo Gun, Music City USA, Second Fiddle to a Steel Guitar, and The Road to Nashville.
18.
Webb Pierce had North Hollywood tailor Nudie Cohen, who had made flamboyant suits for Pierce, line two convertibles with silver dollars.
19.
Webb Pierce remained with Decca and its successor, MCA, well into the 1970s, but by 1977, he was recording for Plantation Records.
20.
Webb Pierce waged a long battle with pancreatic cancer, dying on February 24,1991, and was buried in the Woodlawn Memorial Park in Nashville.
21.
Webb Pierce has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1600 Vine Street.
22.
Webb Pierce was inducted, posthumously, into the Country Music Hall of Fame in October 2001 and into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2008.
23.
Gail Davies herself first charted in 1978 with "No Love Have I", a number-26 Billboard Country hit that Webb Pierce had recorded in 1959.
24.
Webb Pierce's hit single "More and More" was played in the title credits of the 2006 horror film The Hills Have Eyes.