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One of the
biggest hit songs of the 1940’s came about as a
result of someone’s girlfriend being chased by a
jealous wife!
According to Al
Dexter, he was operating a tavern in Texas at the
time. A guy came in late one night and had a
beautiful woman named
JoAnn
with him. The guy asked Al to give the woman a
job. Al hired the woman, and then later found out
that the guy who brought her in was married to
another woman. And late one night the man’s wife
came in the tavern looking for
JoAnn
and telling everyone she was going to kill her
when she found her!
Dexter said
that several months later, he was in another honky
tonk
and
JoAnn
came in all scratched up. She said that that same
man’s wife was after her and had chased her
through a barbed wire fence with a gun!
Al added, “The
first thing I thought of was how in the world do
you talk to a woman who’s chasing you with a gun?
And then the words, ‘lay that pistol down babe’
came to my mind. And that’s how ‘Pistol
Packin’
Mama’ was written!”
Al Dexter’s
recording of “Pistol
Packin’
Mama” entered the country music charts January 8th,
1944 and made it to number one, where it
stayed for three weeks. It was on the country
music charts for 10 weeks. The record also scored
a number one on the pop music charts.
Al Dexter (real name: Clarence
Albert Poindexter) died in 1984 and the age of 81.
Doug Davis
Country Music Classics
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