Geo-Biography of Hank Williams

0: Hurtin' with Hank 1: Birthplace

There isn't much to see in Mount Olive, Alabama, today, and there wasn't much when Hiram "Hank" Williams was born here on September 17, 1923. Long gone is the double-pen log house where he made his debut. It was still called "the Kendrick place" after the man who built it in the late 1800s.

His parents were Elonzo "Lon" Huble Williams and Jessie Lillybelle Skipper Williams. Daddy worked on the railroad; Ma played the organ at church; for a while they ran a general store. Hank's earliest memory was of sitting on the organ bench next to his mother, howling' out the hymns.
Hank had an older sister, Irene, and a brother who died shortly after birth. Hank also had a spinal bifida condition that troubled him throughout his life, and which was further aggravated when he was thrown from a horse at age 17.

1: Hurtin' with Hank 2: Growin' up

The family moved with Lon's railroad jobs, first to the outskirts of Georgiana, then in 1927 to McWilliams, Alabama, where Hank attended his first two years of school.

Starting in January 1930 Lon was institutionalised often at veterans' hospitals, first in Pensacola, Florida, then in Alexandria, Louisiana. It was "shell shock", a delayed reaction to the horrors he'd experienced during World War I. He never came home again – Lilly divorced him during his 10-year absence.

2: Hurtin' with Hank 3: Boyhood home

When his father was first hospitalised, Lilly's brother-in-law took Hank's family in at the house in Garland, Alabama, where Lilly's mother also lived. Then they moved into a dilapidated wooden shack on old Highway 31 in Georgiana, but it burned down a few months later, and they were offered a new house rent-free by Thaddeus B Rose, here on a street he'd named for himself.

The house is today the Hank Williams Sr Boyhood Home and Museum, which for a quarter century has been hosting a Hank Williams Festival of music at the Hank Williams Music Park next door.

And the stretch of Interstate 65 between Georgiana and Montgomery is now knwon as the Hank Williams Memorial Lost Highway, dedicated as such in a 1997 ceremony attended by Hank Williams Jr.

This is where Hank got his first guitar, in 1931. He even went to shape-note singing school in nearby Avant, but in 1934 local blues street singer Rufus "Tee-Tot" Payne provided his first real musical education, showing him how to play his guitar properly. Hank was soon performing around Georgiana and Greenville, still in his early teens. Payne died in 1939 and is buried not far from Williams.

3: Hurtin' with Hank 4: Greenville

In 1933 Hank moved to Fountain, Alabama, to live with his cousins in three boxcars while he attended grammar school. This is, by one account, where Hank started drinking.

The following year Hank's family moved to Greenville, a larger community 15 miles closer to Montgomery, and Lilly set up a boarding house while working at a local cannery.

4: Hurtin' with Hank 5: Montgomery

Hank was 13 when the family moved to the big city in July 1937. His mother opened a boarding house here at 114 South Perry Street.

5: Hurtin' with Hank 6: The Empire Theater

In December 1937 Hank won the talent show at the Empire Theater, singing his own composition, "WPA Blues", and was promptly put on the air, broadcasting on WSFA Montgomery.

Built in 1914, the Empire theater-cum-cinema was demolished in August 1997, two months before a hearing on its historical status. Its main claim to fame is as the site where Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white passenger. The site is now occupied by the Rosa Parks Memorial Library.

Hank the teenage radio star quit school in '39 and two years later had his own band, the Drifting Cowboys, who in one form or another would stick with him to the end.
He had other jobs, doing some welding at the Kaiser Shipyard in Oregon in 1942, though a Montggomery pal who was with him said he spent most of his time in the honky-tonks. When his money ran out he wired home for train fare to get back to Montgomery.
In December he began two years' toil at Alabama Dry Dock and Shipbuilding co in Mobile, but he was still playing shows in and around Montgomery.

6: Hurtin' with Hank 7: Marryin' man

In May 1943 Hank was the warm-up act at the Montgomery City Auditorium for Pee Wee King. Then at a Labor Day show he happened to be backstage when Hardrock Gunter needed the guitar he'd left onstage. Hank volunteered to retrieve it, but instead picked it up and did a show that brought down the house. Then he tried to leave with Hardrock's guitar!

Touring with a medicine show in 1943, Hank met Audrey Mae Sheppard, a married 20-year-old from Banks, Alabama. She lived and worked with him for a couple of months on the welding bay in Mobile and then, 10 days after her divorce was finalised in December '44, they got married on the 15th at a filling station here in Andalusia, Alabama, a little burg where he had a regular gig.

Williams' performing style has been described as intense, his head and torso movements restricted by his bad back. Tall and rangy, Hank half-bent into the microphone, crouching around his guitar, his knees pumping and swinging from side to side.

7: Hurtin' with Hank 8: Newylweds

The newlyweds lived with Hank's mom in Montgomery when he got back his job on WSFA, but that was interrupted once again by booze. Hank spent a while drying out in a sanitarium in Prattville, Alabama, then got an early morning show on the air, and then in September 1946 moved to the 4pm slot.
At some point Hank was able to buy a house here on Stuart Street, which he sold when they moved to Nashville in 1949.

8: Hurtin' with Hank 9: Castle Studio

Audrey, having displaced Hank's mother as his manager, brought him to Nashville in September '46 to meet Fred Rose of Acuff-Rose Publishing, who bought a pair of Hank's songs for singer Molly O'Day. "Never Again" and "Honky Tonkin'" were both successful, and Williams was invited to record for Sterling Records, but got swiftly promoted to the higher-profile MGM label.

In December he did his first recording sessions, the Willis brothers backing him up at WSM Studios and here at Castle Studio. "Move It on Over", released later in '47, became Hank's first Top 5 hit.

Nicknamed "Air Castle of the South", Castle Studio was in the ballroom of the now-defunct Tulane Hotel here at 8th and Church, which closed in 1954. Hank returned here many more times to record.

9: Hurtin' with Hank 10: The Louisiana Hayride

On August 7, 1948, Hank Williams debuted on the Louisiana Hayride, and quickly became a fixture on its tours and radio programs. "Honky Tonkin'" was released that year, followed by "I'm a Long Gone Daddy", both popular, though not matching the success of "Move It on Over".

Every Saturday night from 1948 to the end of the '50s, the Louisiana Hayride was broadcast live nationwide by KWKH, headquartered here on West Post Avenue. The shows themselves took place at Shreveport's 3,800-seat Municipal Auditorium, pictured below, which marknelson has previously posted here: http://tinyurl.com/qnxwa
A latecomer in the era of radio "barn dances", which began in the 1920s, the Hayride was the brainstorm of Horace "Hoss" Logan (1916-2002), who emceed the shows right from the start on April 3, 1948.

"The Cradle of the Stars", as the Hayride became known, played a crucial role in the careers of Johnny Cash, Faron Young, Jim Reeves, Willie Nelson, Slim Whitman, George Jones and Johnny Horton, as well as Hank Williams, and of course Elvis Presley debuted there in October 1954. (It was Logan, trying to quiet a frenzied Hayride audience after a Presley show, who first said, "Elvis has left the building.")

10: Hurtin' with Hank 11: Domestically challenged

In early '49 Hank's recording of Emmett Miller's "Lovesick Blues" hit No 1 and stayed there for 16 weeks, even crossing over into the pop Top 25. He was now a star who could no longer be ignored by the biggest show in country music, the Grand Ole Opry.

Before he claimed that venerable stage, he welcomed into the world a star of his own. Randall Hank Williams – the future Hank Williams Jr – was born on May 26, 1949, in Shreveport. Hank nicknamed him "Little Bocephus" after a ventriloquist's dummy that was featured on the Opry at the time.

By August, Hank and Audrey had moved to Nashville, and the following month he bought a house here at 2510 Franklin. The family's pictured here at home; the little girl is Lycrecia, Audrey's daughter from her first marriage.

11: Hurtin' with Hank 12: The Grand Ole Opry

Hank Williams took the stage in triumph for his Grand Ole Opry debut here at the Ryman Auditorium on June 18, 1949. (Some accounts say June 11, but that appearance wasn't part of the broadcast segment.)
He sang "Lovesick Blues", which by then had sold three million copies. The reception was fantastic, although not everyone believes the legend that he earned six encores and that emcee Red Foley had to plead with the audience to let the show continue. It's also been said that, in tribute to Williams, they wouldn't let anyone else get more than five encores after that. Hank was quickly bundled into an Opry package tour that entertained GIs stationed in Germany.

12: Hurtin' with Hank 13: Tootsies Orchid Lounge

Tootsies Orchid Lounge at 422 Broadway was called Mom's in the days when Hank infamously sneaked in here between turns onstage at the Ryman across the alley. It's still running today.
It's legendary status really developed, though, after the late Tootsie Bess bought the place in 1960.

A singer and comedienne with Big Jeff & The Radio Playboys (Jeff Bess was her husband), Tootsie had a couple of records of her own out. Her customers included Patsy Cline, Kris Kristofferson, Faron Young, Willie Nelson, Tom T Hall, Hank Cochran, Mel Tillis, Webb Pierce, Waylon Jennings and Roger Miller, who allegedly wrote "Dang Me" here. Willie Nelson reputedly got his first songwriting job after singing at Tootsie’s.
Scenes for "WW & the Dixie Dance Kings" and "Coal Miner’s Daughter" were shot in this tiny, narrow bar among the grafitti-covered walls, and there have been songs written about the place too, such as "The Wettest Shoulders in Town", no doubt a reference to the owner being a friend in deed to destitute musicians, into whose pockets she was known to slip $5 and $10 bills.

See http://www.tootsies.net/

13: Hurtin' with Hank 14: Corralled

In June 1951 Hank and Audrey's Corral, a shop selling cowboy outfits, opened here at at 724 Commerce Street, two doors down from the original Ernest Tubb record store. These days you can find it online at http://www.hankandaudreyscorral.com

Purchases benefit Audrey's Dream, founded in Hank and Audrey's memory by Lycrecia Williams Hoover, Audrey's daughter by her first marriage, and her partner Dale Vinicur. It and the planned Hank & Audrey Williams Center are described as "a whole new idea in recovery centres" for people with substance-abuse problems and their families.
Alcohol cut short Audrey's life too, at age 52 at the home on Franklin Road. See http://www.audreysdream.org

14: Hurtin' with Hank 15: Natchez Trace

Hank had bought a farm somewhere in Williamson County outside Nashville in 1951, but it's not clear whether this was the "home he shared with singer Jerry Rivers on Natchez Trace".
He injured his back while hunting at the farm in 1951 and underwent a "spine fusion" at Vanderbilt University Hospital, but the injury necessitated a diet of painkillers to keep him working.
He also started drinking more heavily than ever, and things quickly spun out of control. His marriage was the first casualty.

15: Hurtin' with Hank 16: Westwood Drive

On and off in 1952, Hank stayed at a place at 2718 Westwood with Ray Price. He and Audrey had split for a final time. On Mother's Day, Lillie came by to visit with Lycrecia and Hank Jr. By mid-year Hank had moved back to Montgomery to live with his mama, and put on a homecoming show in Greenville, Alabama.

There were never-ending hits – "Honky Tonk Blues","Half As Much", "Jambalaya", "Settin' the Woods on Fire", "You Win Again" – all Top 10s. In March he joined June Carter, Carl Smith and Roy Acuff on Kate Smith's TV show, beamed from New York.

16: Hurtin

Williams did a string of shows in California in April 1952 – San Jose, Oakland, Bakersfield. Ralph J Gleason interviewed him on the 15th for the San Fransisco Chronicle and wrote about the experience later in Rolling Stone. He went to his room at Oakland's Leamington Hotel.
"I was a little surprised by the pills, but then he looked pale and thin, and had deep-set eyes and might have been hung over for all I knew." Hank told Gleason he was doing 200 one-nighters a year and grossing over $400,000.

The Leamington Hotel, declared a landmark in 1977, once housed an office of aviator Amelia Earhart. It was one of two times her and Hank's paths would "cross".

17: Hurtin

Williams played somewhere in San Diego on his brief California jaunt in April 1952. During the first of his two shows on one night, he was so drunk that he fell off stage before the third number. Minnie Pearl and the wife of the promoter drove him around town in hopes of to sobering him up for the second show and tried the old sing-along ruse. He managed one verse of "I Saw the Light", then told Minnie, "I don't see no light. There ain't no light."

In September 1951 Hank had signed a movie contract with MGM, and they talked about projects when Hank was in Los Angeles, but the deal floated in limbo until the studio finally abandoned it in June '52. He ended up being portrayed by George Hamilton in a rather scurrilous 1964 biopic that Audrey helped script.

18: Hurtin' with Hank 20: Kaw-Liga!

On August 15, 1952, Hank Williams bought the car he'd die in – a brand-new, baby blue Cadillac – and the next day drove out to a cabin here at Camp Kawliga on Lake Martin for a vacation. He was joined later by 19-year-old Billie Jean Jones Eshlimar, a girl from Bossier City, Louisiana, he'd met in June at the Opry (she'd been Faron Young's date).

This is where he wrote "Kaw-Liga", about the Native American legend of Kowaliga that gave the creek and bay here their name. He was soused at the time, and in fact was later arrested, shirtless, at a hotel in neighbouring Alexander City for public drunkenness, a press photographer capturing the scene for posterity.

19: Hurtin' with Hank 21: Crossroads

Beloved by millions but battered by hard liquor and the painkillers he needed for his lifelong back condition, which was becoming progressively worse, Hank Williams was at a crossroads in the autumn of 1952.

Kicked off the Grand Ole Opry, he was back on the B-list, performing with the Louisiana Hayride and in a string of Texas beerhalls. The songs he was writing and recording at the time had titles like "The Pale Horse and His Rider", "The Angel of Death" and "I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive".

On the other hand, his new "Jambalaya" was one of his best-selling records yet, there were indications that he'd soon be welcomed back at the Opry, and he had major engagements coming up. In September he was back in Castle Studio in Nashville, recording "Your Cheatin' Heart", "I Could Never Be Ashamed of You", "Kaw-Liga" and "Take These Chains from My Heart".

20: Hurtin' with Hank 22: Triple wedding

On October 18, 1952, Williams married the newly divorced 19-year-old Billie Jean Jones Eshlimar before a Justice of the Peace in Minden, Louisiana, following his appearance on the Hayride.
The next day here at the New Orleans Municipal Auditorium they got married again – twice – in front of 14,000 people who paid $2 apiece to witness the nuptials. They were both terrified that Audrey would show up and make a scene.
Two weeks later Hank checked into a sanitarium to dry out, then played a slew of shows in Texas, Kansas and Louisiana, then went right back into rehab.
In the midst of all this, Hank signed an agreement to support the baby of a Nashville secretary named Bobbie Jett. The baby, due in January, would grow up to be country singer Jett Williams.

The New Orleans Municipal Auditorium – now officially the Morris FX Jeff Senior Municipal Auditorium – opened in 1930 and was previously home to basketball's Jazz. Damaged by Hurricane Katrina, it's future is uncertain.

21: Hurtin

On December 12 Hank walked out of a sanitarium in Shreveport, got hammered downtown, and was arrested and carted straight back.

On the 13th he made his final appearance on the Louisiana Hayride, and the next day began a one-week tour of Texas and Mississippi. He played Biloxi on the 15th and Stark's Skyline Club in Austin on the 19th. He was in great voice, but bodily on the verge of a breakdown. "I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive" was heading for No 1 on the charts.

His mother took him home to her boarding house on North McDonough Street in Montgomery to recuperate from the flu over Christmas, ready for his big "comeback" dates in Charleston, West Virginia, on New Year's Eve and Canton, Ohio, on New Year's Day.

On the 21st Hank retraced his path to Greenville and sang for his cousin at their store. On Christmas Day he went to visit his father in Pensacola, but he wasn't home, so Hank left a box of chocolates, scrawling a note on the cellophane wrapper. Old Lon, who would only see his son again in a casket, kept the cellophane for the rest of his long life.

22: Hurtin' with Hank 24: The last show

On December 28, Williams played his last gig, a New Year's party for the Montgomery chapter of the American Federation of Musicians at the Elite Cafe, somewhere here on Montgomery Street. The next night he had trouble sleeping. "Billie," he told his new wife, "I think I see God coming down the road."

23: Hurtin' with Hank 25: No more no-shows

On New Year's Eve 1952, Charleston, West Virginia, was to have hosted the first of Hank Williams' two big "comeback" shows. Unlike the other venue in Canton, Ohio, though, the promoter was advised well in advance that Hank wouldn't be able to make it, and the concert was cancelled outright.
AV Bamford got a call from Williams' driver in Knoxville, Tennessee, saying the singer was running way behind because of the fog, and was ill besides. "Bam" told him to try and make it to Canton in time for the gig at 2pm on New Year's Day.

24: Hurtin' with Hank 26: The Show He Never Gave

In the late 1970s a stage revue came out of Canada to wide acclaim called "Hank Williams: The Show He Never Gave", which was later filmed with Sneezy Waters in the title role. Ottawa playwright Maynard Collins had extrapolated on what might have happened if Hank had indeed made it to Canton – "America's Playing Field" –- for his booking on January 1, 1953.

What did happen at the Canton Memorial Auditorium that afternoon was that the show went on without the billed "sensational radio-recording star" and "Mr Lovesick Blues".
It opened with a spotlight shining on the curtain as the fans (who'd paid $1.85 each for their seats) were informed that Williams had died earlier that day. His Drifting Cowboys, unseen behind the curtain, sang "I Saw the Light", then the concert proceeded as normal, with the country comedians Homer & Jethro, Autry Inman, fiddler Merle "Red" Taylor and singer Hawkshaw Hawkins, who would die a decade later in the same plane crash that killed Patsy Cline.

Intriguingly, the Canton Memorial Auditorium had a case of deja vu in 1959: Buddy Holly and the Crickets were booked to play here on February 12 – nine days after he was killed.

Now known as the Canton Memorial Civic Center, the 5,500-seat auditorium was built in 1951.

25: Hurtin' with Hank 27: One for the road

On December 30, Hank loaded his guitar and stage outfits into his Cadillac outside his mother's boarding house, which was here at 324 North McDonough Street (318 by another account).
At about 11.30am, he set off on his last ride. He'd hoped to fly to Charleston but a snowfall changed his mind. Behind the wheel was Charles Carr, a 19-year-old college freshman whose father knew Hank and arranged the chauffeur's job.
They visited a succession of radio DJs around Montgomery, and Hank agreed to put in an appearance at a highway contractors' convention at a local hotel, where he likely had a few drinks.

Carr next drove him to his doctor to get a shot of morphine to ease his back pain for the ride to Charleston, and they bought a six-pack of Falstaff beer, though Carr said Hank drank little. Williams evidently also brought along chloral hydrate to help him sleep. It's designed to slow the heartbeat, but it's dangerous when mixed with alcohol – the combination was infamous as the surreptitious knock-out formula involved in "slipping someone a Mickey". With morphine added to the cocktail, psychosis can result – or self-euthanasia.

By early afternoon they were northbound on Highway 31.

26: Hurtin' with Hank 28: Snowed in

A snowstorm blew up in the late afternoon, forcing Williams and Carr to check in here at the Redmont Hote in Birmingham, Alabama. Within 30 minutes, several women had found their way into Hank's room. Hank asked where they were from, and one replied, "Heaven." She was the reason, Hank replied, that he was going to hell.

The journey resumed early the next morning, December 31. Somewhere en route Hank bought some booze, and "Jambalaya" was on the radio. Carr told him it made no sense. "That's 'cause you don't understand French," Hank laughed.
Beyond this point there are a lot of detours in the story. Frazzled memories and frenzied reporting seem to have got the better of the truth, and attempts to unravel the facts in the years since have only produced a fine knot of contradictions. We'll do out best to follow the straight and narrow.

27: Hurtin' with Hank 29: Big tipper

In Fort Payne, Alabama, Williams bought a pint of bourbon and they went to a restaurant for breakfast. "He walked up to our server," Carr recalled, "and said, 'Here's the biggest tip you ever got.' And he gave him $50. Money didn't mean anything to Hank."

28: Hurtin' with Hank 30: Grounded

It's widely reported that a snowstorm again stalled Carr and Williams , but newspaper records suggest fog ahead of Chattanooga, not snow, as the likely reason they couldn't follow through on a plan to speed their progress.
Arriving in Knoxville around 10.30am, it was obvious that the only way Hank was going to be on time for the Charleston show was to fly. At McGhee Tyson Airport they board a 3.30 flight, but the weather turned the plane around. They were back on the runway by 6pm.

29: Hurtin' with Hank 31: Checking out

Carr and Williams checked into the Andrew Johnson Hotel in Knoxville, Tennessee, at 7.08pm, Hank by this time requiring the help of a pair of porters to get to his room. Carr ordered them each a steak, and Hank ate a little as he lay on the bed.
Hank began convulsively hiccuping and a doctor was summoned. Finding the patient "very drunk", he administered shots of morphine and vitamin B12. There has been speculation that Williams had earlier been injected with morphine by a sympathetic physician at the same city's St Mary's Hospital. Later in the night he fell off the bed.

Carr phoned promoter AV Bamford to let him know they wouldn't be making it to Charleston. Bamford urged him to try and be on time for the 2pm New Year's Day matinee in Canton. That was still more than 400 miles away, so Carr decided to check them out early and had the porters take Williams to the car in a wheelchair. By one account, the porters said Hank was wheezing and/or coughing, leading to drawn-out debate as to whether a dead man could make such sounds.
"Hank got in on his own," Carr testified. "I clearly remember that." But the porters said they hoisted him into the back seat and covered him with his blue overcoat. A lot of people think he was already dead at this point.

The 17-storey Andrew Johnson was Knoxville's finest hotel, its 350 rooms accommodating Smokey Mountain tourists. Local boy Roy Acuff got his start performing on WNOX on the hotel's top floor.
Amelia Earhart had stayed here in 1936, the year before she disappeared, and pianist Sergei Rachmaninoff just before he died from undiagnosed cancer.
Williams' ghost is to this day said to haunt the hotel (now a commercial property), but it's also on record as showing up at the Ryman Auditorium, private homes in Tennessee and Alabama and various honky-tonks throughout the South.

30: Hurtin' with Hank 32: No stopping now

Carr set off at 10.45pm. An article written on the 50th anniversary of Williams' death for Knoxville-based MetroPulse.com set a sardonic scene: "Carr likely drove north on Gay Street, which was quiet at that hour except for some boys milling around on the sidewalks with firecrackers in their pockets, waiting for midnight. He likely drove by the Tennessee Theatre, which was then opening its doors for an 11:15 showing of a Broderick Crawford movie called 'Stop, You're Killing Me'."

Placemarked here, the Tennessee Theatre opened in 1928, closed in 1977, reopened in 1981 and was named Official State Theatre in 1999. Once host to the likes of Helen Hayes and Glenn Miller, "Knoxville's Grand Entertainment Palace" is on the National Register of Historic Places and currently offers everything from classical music to stage productions to cinema.

31: Hurtin' with Hank 33: Don't worry about him

Heading out of town, they stopped for gas at about 11 at a 24-hour Esso station on Magnolia Avenue at Winona. The pump attendant noticed the prone figure in the back seat. "He was dressed up in dress clothes, white shirt, no tie. He was foaming at the mouth. I told that young man, 'He looks like he's dead'. The guy said, 'Don't worry about him. He's drunk and passed out'."

A widow whose husband ran a drive-in short-order and beer store on US Highway 11W in the Three Points area told MetroPulse in 2002 that the car stopped there – two cars carrying musicians in fact. He overheard that Hank was in the back seat of and went to have a look but he seemed to be asleep.

32: Hurtin' with Hank 34: A final bust

At about 11.45 Carr was stopped near Blaine, Tennessee, by Patrolman Swan Kitts after he almost hit Kitts' cruiser while trying to pass someone. Carr explained that he was rushing Hank Williams to a show in Ohio, and said Williams had been drinking and had had a sedative.
Tracking the last ride in 2002, Peter Cooper of The Tennessean placed the pull-over spot at what had been the location of the Skyway Drive-In Theater in Corryton, not far from here. He found the drive-in long closed, marked only by a rusty sign next to Edd's Grocery.

33: Hurtin' with Hank 35: Wreckless

Kitts had Carr follow him here to Rutledge, where Carr was fined $25 for wreckless driving. Kitts noted a soldier with Carr. The drive-in widow thought her husband had spoken of the chauffeur picking up a hitchhiker, a "serviceman".

34: Hurtin' with Hank 36: Last words

At 1am Carr continued on but, worn out after going without sleep for almost 24 hours, stopped in Bristol, Tennessee. This is where he supposedly picked up a relief driver at a local taxi company, a young man named Donald Surface.
"I remember Hank got out to stretch his legs and I asked him if he wanted a sandwich or something," Carr said. "And he said, 'No, I just want to get some sleep.' "I don't know if that's the last thing he said, but it's the last thing I remember him telling me."

Peter Cooper of The Tennessean, reconstructing the route for a 50th-anniversary article in 2002, wrote that Carr stopped here at the corner of Sycamore Street, bought some gas and got a sandwich at Trayer's Restaurant, "a few blocks from the spot where Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family recorded the 1927 'Bristol Sessions' that helped give rise to the commercial country music industry".
But Cooper doubted that Carr picked up Donald Surface in Bristol, saying Carr remembered that happening in Bluefield, West Virginia, which was, after all, Surface's hometown and where he worked, at the Bluefield Cab Co. Surface died long ago.

35: Hurtin' with Hank 37: West Virginia

The conventional account of Hank Williams' last ride has Donald Surface driving him and Carr from Bristol, up 11W onto curving, rising 19 North into West Virginia, where Carr paid him off in either Bluefield or Princeton when they stopped for coffee.

Bluefield was then a bustling coal town, Peter Cooper of The Tennessean wrote in 2002, and they likely stopped at Dough Boy Lunch, which was open all night.
"Carr remembers getting a sandwich and a Coke ... then speaking to a cab company dispatcher who offered Donald Surface's services."

36: Hurtin' with Hank 38: Princeton, West Virginia

Tennessean writer Peter Cooper reckons Carr may have dropped off Donald Surface here at Courthouse Lunch on Alvis Road in Princeton, now a bank, though Carr – in 2002 a Montgomery businessman in his 60s – could no longer remember when they parted company.

37: Hurtin' with Hank 39: A memorial bridge

The Hank Williams Senior Memorial Bridge straddles the Bluestone River, designated a National Scenic River, on Route 19 outside Spanishburg. Hank crossed it once, on New Year's Eve 1952.
I'm not sure of the exact location.

38: Hurtin' with Hank 40: Camp Creek, W Virginia

39: Hurtin' with Hank 41: Flat Top, W Virginia

40: Hurtin' with Hank 42: Beckley, W Virginia

41: Hurtin' with Hank 43: Lemon sour?

Carr drove on all night. In 2002, on the 50th anniversay of Hank's death, an employee of a store called Bon Bon's here in Mount Hope told Peter Cooper of The Tennessean that she was working there as a teenager when the Cadillac stopped across the street and the driver came in and asked for a drink for Hank Williams, who was in the car and feeling unwell. She gave him a lemon sour in a Styrofoam cup and told him, "Okay, don't die." Carr, however, told the same reporter he was certain he didn't stop at Bon Bon's.

42: Hurtin' with Hank 44: Got a problem

Most accounts of the last ride have Carr stopping for a toilet break around dawn after a long haul. One actually places a "Skyline Drive-In restaurant" here in Hilltop, West Virginia, adding to the confusion when we've already seen a Skyline drive-in theater in Tennessee.
Or did Carr not stop until he reached Peter Burdette's Pure Oil gas station in Oak Hill, where most accounts say it was finally decided that Hank Williams was indeed dead?

Having interviewed Carr, the best Peter Cooper of The Tennessean could offer was that "somewhere between Mount Hope and Oak Hill", Carr noticed Williams' blanket had fallen off him.
"I saw that the overcoat and blanket that had been covering Hank had slipped off," Carr told yet another reporter. "When I pulled it back up, I noticed that his hand was stiff and cold." When he tried to move his hands, they snapped back to the same position the hotel porters had reportedly arranged him in.
Carr told Cooper this happened at the side of the road six miles from Oak Hill, but investigating officer Howard Janney placed it in the Skyline Drive-In restaurant's parking lot, noting that Carr sought help from a Skyline employee. Another researcher decided it could have happened at any of the gas stations near Mount Hope. Regardless, Carr said he next drove to "a cut-rate gas station". "I went inside and an older guy, around 50, came back out with me, looked in the back seat, and said, 'I think you've got a problem'. He was very kind, and said Oak Hill General Hospital was six miles on my left."

43: Hurtin' with Hank 45: Out of gas

This is the approximate site of Burdette's Pure Oil gas station in Oak Hill, West Virginia, which by most accounts was where the fact of Hank's death was actually discovered after his long, cold ride. If so, it was the station attendants who failed to rouse Williams and directed Carr to the local hospital – not six miles away but a quarter mile.
"Burdette's had nothing to do with it," Carr said in 2002, insisting he'd driven the six miles straight to the hospital, "and two interns looked at Hank and said, 'He's dead.' I said, 'Is there anything you can do for him?' They said, 'No, he's dead.' They took him, and they didn't use a stretcher. They put him on an examining table."

Ambitions to convert the long-closed, 1935-vintage Pure Oil station, pictured below, into a museum honouring Williams came to nothing in August 2006 when the local council failed to agree on a lease with owner Charlie Jones, who then said he would demolish it before winter, having waited three years for a decision. Jones, who also owns a horse ranch across the road, didn’t want to sell the property.

44: Hurtin' with Hank 46: Hank was here

Across Main Street from the Pure Oil gas station is the Oak Hill Library, which today has a bronze plaque mounted on a stone pedestal bearing an affectionate tribute to Hank from his local fans.
It was dedicated on September 17, 1991 – Hank's birthday. Two years later Oak Hill held a Hank Williams tribute concert at the Fayette Armory, and when the band started playing "I Saw the Light", there was a power cut.

45: Hurtin' with Hank 47: He's dead alright

Today known as the Plateau Medical Center, the Oak Hill Hospital was staffed early on January 1, 1952, by young physicians and interns from overseas. Hank Williams, still just 29, was pronounced dead on arrival. An intern marked the time of death as 7am but estimated that he could have been dead for as long as six hours.

Carr phoned his father and then got a call from Hank's mother. "One of the parting things she said was, 'Don't let anything happen to the car'."

46: Hurtin' with Hank 48: Last of the lyrics

Hank's body was taken across the street to the Tyree Funeral Home. The placemark shows its current location at 999 Jones Avenue, though the building it occupied on Main Street in 1952 still stands. Established in 1927, the Tyree home has its own rowsing account of the episode here: http://www.funeralplan.com/tyree/hank

47: Hurtin' with Hank 49: Mother knows best

Hank's mother Lillian Stone and Charles Carr's father arrived the next morning via taxi from Roanoke airport. Here at the police station, Lillian proffered legal papers to show she was the closest kin, since Hank's marriage to Billie Jean in October appeared to be invalid – her divorce hadn't been finalised until late December.

At the funeral home she chose a casket and from the Cadillac retrieved one of Hank's white cowboy outfits. Described as "pleasant and composed", Lillian had everything arranged by the time Billie Jean and her father arrived later in the day.
Mrs Stone arranged for funeral-parlour staff to drive the body by hearse to Montgomery, while she and the Carrs returned in the Cadillac. Hank's songs were playing on the car radios all the way.

This photo from the City of Montgomery archives shows Lillian and Hank's ex-wife Audrey sifting through letters later that month. Hank Jr watches. Below that, Lilly's telegram to Hank's sister Irene.

48: Hurtin' with Hank 50: Hank wasn't here

Waiting in the wings in 2006 for Oak Hill's decision about setting up a Hank Williams museum were the owners of the Mount Laurel restaurant just up Route 19 in Fayetteville. With a collection of Williams memorabilia already in hand, they were poised to establish a museum on their property by September 16, 2006, the eve of Hank's birthday.

49: Hurtin' with Hank 51: The mourning masses

Hank's body was returned to Montgomery on January 3. He "lay in state" at his mother's boarding house, the casket bedecked with a guitar-shaped floral arrangement, as thousands of mourners came by. Several days after the funeral Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe were passing through Montgomery and signed the book of condolences.

50: Hurtin' with Hank 52: Ready with a song

Across the street from the auditorium today is a life-size statue of Hank, unveiled by Hank Williams Jr in 1991, but as of 2006, the auditorium stage was covered with shelves holding municipal documents, and the city's finance and housing-codes departments occupied the seating area. The cost of refurbishing the once-beautiful building for use again as a public theatre was estimated at up to $4 million.

51: Hurtin' with Hank 53: The Hank Williams Museum

The Hank Williams Museum was founded in 1999 by Beth Birtley, whose father, Cecil Jackson, rotated and balanced the tires on Hank's 1952 Cadillac a week before the singer died. The Caddy is now on display here. Hank Williams Jr had a hand in establishing the museum.

The original Hank Williams once bought a coke for an eight-year-old Cecil when he stopped at a gas station across the street from Cecil's home, and then three years later, performing at the Lightwood Community in Elmore Country, dedicated a song to Cecil and his fellow "Lightwood flat fixers" after they'd changed a tire for him.

Then he had to get back on the road.