Johnny Horton was born in Los Angeles, but at an early age he moved
with his sharecropping parents to Tyler, Texas, where he grew up.
Fishing was an early interest in life and he traveled to Alaska to seek
employment in this capacity, but after returning to Texas he took up
singing. His singing career began in 1950 in Pasadena, California, on
radio station KXLA. He later became a regular on "Hometown Jamboree"
with Cliffie Stone, on which he was billed as "The Singing Fisherman".
In 1951 he made his first recording.
In 1953 he married the widow of
Hank Williams, and she took an
interest in furthering his career. He became a regular on the radio
show "Louisiana Hayride" in 1955 and soon after made an appearance on
"Grand Ole Opry". His first hit, "Honky Tonk Man", came in 1956 and was
soon followed by "When It's Springtime in Alaska", "The Battle of New
Orleans", "Johnny Reb" and "Sink the Bismarck".
In 1960 he recorded "North to Alaska" for the motion picture of the
same name
(Land der 1000 Abenteuer (1960)) starring
John Wayne and
Stewart Granger. At this point
in his career he decided to add acting to his accomplishments and
planned on beginning a movie career, but this was not to be. On a foggy
night in November of 1960, he was returning from a concert with his
manager, Tillman B. Franks, and his
bass player, Tommy Tomlinson, when tragedy struck. A car driven by a
drunk driver came out of the fog and collided with Johnny's car head
on. Horton was killed instantly.
