Eddie Dean may have had one of the best singing voices in western movies, but it took almost a decade before he was allowed to show it. Dean was born on July 9, 1907 as Edgar Glosup in Posey, Texas, seemed to have minor roles in everybody else’s westerns before he finally landed a series of his own.

Eddie started out as a radio singer in the early 1930s, and joined the “National Barn Dance” in 1934 on radio station WLS in Chicago.  He appeared in small roles in westerns (except for his last film appearance, “Varieties On Parade” in 1951 and “Down Missouri Way” in 1946, all 45 of his movie appearances were in westerns).  In addition to the movie bits, Dean was extremely active in radio, and by the 1940s, was strummin’ and singin’ on Gene Autry’s “Melody Ranch” program and later, “The Judy Canova Show.”

In less than a year, movie fans lost three of filmdom’s singing cowboys: Roy Rogers and Gene Autry in 1998 and Eddie Dean in 1999. Dean’s death on March 4, 1999 did not generate the publicity that followed the passing of the other two stars, but his film career started almost as early as theirs did and he even appeared in some of their movies.

Paul Dellinger

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