Remembering Jerry Clower once again...

Nearly 10 years ago (February 2013) I wrote a blog entry about the late entertainer, Jerry Clower. You can read that blog entry when you click this LINK. In that blog entry I provided some detail about his life and career in addition to remarking that I have a copy of all of his albums in one format or another (vinyl, cassette, CD). 

Earlier today I purchased three books that he wrote...yes, you read that correctly...he was an author/co-author of several entertaining books. The books featured his commentary and recollection of his past, partial copies of some of the humorous expressions/catchphrases from his comedy stories, and how life in America dramatically changed...some for the good but some aspects of progress changed the country in a negative way. His religious convictions were interwoven into his comedy stories and can be found in each of his books...particularly the first one. The books with Jerry Clower's name as author/co-author are:

1. Ain't God Good? (1975)

2. Let The Hammer Down! (1978)

3. Life EverLaughter (1987)

4. Stories from Home (1993) 

The first book was a massive success and sold so strong that it had at least 3 reprintings...and it inspired a documentary. Jerry Clower recorded all of his comedy albums for MCA Records...except for one...a 1977 release on Word Records (a religious imprint) titled Ain't God Good?. The album was a follow-up to the 1976 documentary and the 1975 book. In addition to comedy records Jerry was also a consistent presence on syndicated radio and television programs...and local/regional television commercials. As an entertainer he toured all over the South and Midwest heavily. In a separate career he was indeed a major radio and television personality. On radio he was a co-host on the Country Crossroads program...a syndicated radio series with a religious overtone created by Bill Mack. In fact, Bill Mack hosted the series solo in it's early years. Jerry Clower and Leroy Van Dyke came on board as co-hosts and interviewers. Jerry's debut on the series happened in 1973...and he stayed with the program for several decades. In addition to the local/regional TV and radio commercials he also found time to co-host the syndicated country music television show, Nashville on the Road. He co-hosted this travel show with Jim Ed Brown for 6 seasons, 1975-1981. Jerry Clower was a member of the Grand Ole Opry from 1973 until the year he passed away in 1998. He recorded a 1978 album on the stage of the Opry. The publishers/editors and readers of various country music magazines awarded him Country Comic of the Year throughout the 1970s and into the early 1980s. 

He always remarked that he backed into show business...that he would have been perfectly content making a living working for the Mississippi Chemical Corporation...had it not been for some of his sales pitches for the chemical been recorded and sent to radio stations and record companies. He inserted comical stories into his sales pitches and recordings of those stories began surfacing...and eventually one thing led to another. Ralph Emery played Jerry's comical story of racoon hunting and, as Jerry Clower often recalled, that one airplay turned this chemical/fertilizer salesman into a stand-up country comic seemingly overnight. Born in 1926 as Howard Gerald Clower, the nickname Jerry was derived from his middle name, he was 44 going on 45 when Decca Records came calling on his services...or "how I backed into show business" as he would say.  

Lemon Records issued a comedy album on Jerry in 1971...and this was picked up by the much larger Decca company (eventually retitled MCA). From 1971 until 1978 Jerry released one comedy album per year. Following a 1979 Greatest Hits release he launched another string of releases in which one comedy album per year was released from 1980 until 1995. I was never able to find out why but he didn't release a comedy album in 1996 but what turned out to be his final comedy album shown up in 1998...released after he passed away. It was an album recorded, mostly, in Clanton, Alabama. 

Here's the Jerry Clower album discography. I don't include any of the greatest hits compilations to surface after 1998. Charlie Douglas introduces Jerry on the 1975 album. Charlie, at the time, was a fixture of WWL radio before moving to WSM radio. Ralph Emery does the introduction on the 1986 album...recorded in McEwen, Tennessee on 'Ralph Emery Day'. I include the 1979 release because it's a Gold selling album as are his first two albums. His 1988 album is a live album from Ocilla, Georgia where the selections are newly recorded performances of some of his previously told stories. The 1994 album commemorates Jerry's military service and features a photo of him from 1944 in his Navy uniform. He served in the Navy during WWII (1944 to 1946) and received multiple service medals including an Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal. 

In 2010, more than a decade after he passed away, he was included in a list of dozens of other Mississippi-born performers to receive a historical marker. His marker was unveiled in 2011 in Liberty, Mississippi (his birthplace). 

Howard Gerald "Jerry" Clower

September 28, 1926 - August 24, 1998  

1971: From Yazoo City, Mississippi Talkin'**

1972: Mouth of Mississippi**

1973: Clower Power

1974: Country Ham

1975: Live In Picayune

1976: The Ambassador of Goodwill

1977: On the Road

1977: Ain't God Good? (Word Records; religious testimony)

1978: Live from the Stage of the Grand Ole Opry

1979: Greatest Hits**

1980: Ledbetter Olympics

1981: More Good 'Uns

1982: Dogs I Have Known

1983: Live at Cleburne, Texas

1984: Starke Raving!

1985: An Officer and a Ledbetter

1986: Runaway Truck

1987: Top Gum

1988: Classic Clower (a live album in which Jerry re-tells some of his classic stories)

1989: Let There Be Light!

1990: The Mouth of the Mighty Mississip' (this was his 20th album on MCA)

1991: Racoonteur

1992: Sidewinder

1993: Stories Told Funny

1994: Jerry Joins the Navy

1995: Fish 'n Frogs, Hawgs 'n Dawgs

1997: Live at Dollywood

1998: Peaches and Possums (this was his the last album he recorded) 

Jerry Clower: 1926-1998...

I came across a recent upload of a commercial that Jerry Clower taped at some point in the latter half of his career.

Here's the commercial he did for Electric City. I have no idea of the year it was taped but I'd have to say late 1980s or very early 1990s at the latest but you'll notice that it was meant to air during Christmas season.



I only saw Jerry Clower in person once and that was an outdoor appearance at a local county fair in 1995. The comedy album out that year from Clower was Fishin', Frogs, Hogs, and Dogs...or as it's spelled on the CD cover, Fish'n, Frogs, Hawgs, and Dawgs. On the cover it shown an illustrated picture of Clower and the animals depicted in the CD's title. One of the other subjects depicted on the CD's cover is a fishing lure known as the Helicopter Lure. He and Roland Martin taped an infomercial for it in 1995 and it became a sensation that year in the sport of fishing. The stories told in this album were recorded during a concert he did in Renfro Valley, Kentucky according to the liner notes.

The same year Clower had a supporting role in the Ray Stevens direct-to-video movie, Get Serious!. Clower played the part of Ray's manager, The Colonel. A picture of Ray as Gitarzan and Clower in his Colonel attire is seen in the last panel of the film strip on the back of the home video. This wasn't the first time Jerry and Ray teamed up. Earlier, in 1986, Ray released a comedy single titled "Southern Air". The writers are Brent Holmes and Stuart Dill. In the recording Ray plays the part of a nervous passenger while Jerry plays the pilot and Minnie Pearl is on hand as the flight's stewardess. The recording can be found on Ray's 1986 comedy album, Surely You Joust. During his career, Jerry Clower was part of three long-running programs. In 1973 he became a member of the Grand Ole Opry. The same year he became the co-host of a radio program called Country Crossroads whose other host was songwriter and Texas disc jockey, Bill Mack. The association with these two programs would last 25 years...ending in 1998, the year that Clower passed away. August 2013 will mark 15 years since his death at the age of 71 in 1998. He was born in September 1926 and was nearly a month shy of reaching 72. (September 28, 1926 - August 24, 1998). A third long running program was the weekly television show Nashville on the Road that aired in syndication. Jerry co-hosted this show with Jim Ed Brown from 1975 through 1981. Another element of his visibility were the various local television commercials that he taped. His image (on TV) and voice (on radio) became associated with numerous products. One of those commercials, of course, is embedded near the top of this blog entry. Obviously the biggest reason for his visibility were his comedy albums...one new release per year on MCA Records from 1971 through 1995 and then he emerged with a new one in 1997 and that was followed by what became his final project, Peaches and Possums, released in the late fall of 1998, a few months after his death. There wasn't a new album issued in 1996, his Silver Anniversary with MCA Records, and perhaps that was MCA's way of thanking him for 25 years of laughter and recordings by giving him "the year off" but that's just a guess. As mentioned, a new album hit the market in 1997 titled Live At Dollywood featuring an illustration of Clower wearing a Dolly Parton wig.

I have all of his albums and a few of the compilation/best of releases, too, like Classic Clower Power. You can search the internet for a lot more information on his life and career...he had a rather lengthy association in the Agriculture and Chemical businesses prior to his entrance into the world of country comedy in 1971 (he was in his mid 40's at that point in time). A lot of his experiences as a boy growing up in the depression-era South were spoke of in his comedy stories as was his strong religious values, his experiences in the military during World War Two, his days playing football in college and his later career paths in Agriculture and as a salesman for the Mississippi Chemical Corporation. Almost all of his stories incorporated the antics of a family referred to as The Ledbetter's (two parents and nine children altogether!). The most popular members of the family were Uncle Versie, Marcel, Newgene, and Clovis even though at one time or another each of the siblings individually took center stage in at least one comedy story. There was one story titled "Burning Building" from 1978 which featured ALL of the Ledbetter's as member's of a volunteer fire department and the chaos that ensues as a result. In later years he spoke of distant relatives, newcomers, and in-laws to the Ledbetter family in addition to the core line-up of 11.

In addition to those kinds of family-driven stories he also offered contemporary experiences touring the country, meeting celebrities, life in Yazoo City, Mississippi and his return to the area he grew up, Liberty, Mississippi, in the mid '90s.

The raccoon became something of a logo due to his breakthrough release in 1971 titled "A Coon Huntin' Story". On stage he'd most often appear in either a red, orange, brown, or blue dinner jacket with a face of a raccoon embroidered on his lapel. He also wore yellow suits but didn't wear them too often...he has a comical reason as to why he stopped wearing the yellow suit. Eventually he settled on just wearing a bright red suit since that was the color that he said most of his fans liked seeing him in the best. In addition to the raccoon and the Ledbetter's, hunting dogs were another consistent subject in a lot of his stories. In 1982 he issued an album titled Dogs I Have Known. The most popular hunting dog in his stories was a dog named Hi-Ball. He also spoke of a couple of other dogs named Brummie and Little Red. In a story that appears on the 1982 album he does an entertaining impression of a mean, aggressive and downright insane dog named "Ol' Blue" and the misadventures that happen when he's taken out into the woods on a hunting trip. His passion for the military was on full display in the 1985 album, An Officer and a Ledbetter. The album opened up in an unusual way in that we hear Clower speaking to a pilot. The routine is titled "Fox 12...Over...". Afterward the main part of the album begins.

There are two stretches of highway in Mississippi named in his honor. There is Jerry Clower Blvd. in Yazoo City, Mississippi and the Jerry Clower Highway near his birthplace of Liberty, Mississippi. It was in the mid '90s that he opened up an intimate museum, in his backyard, housing the various certificates, awards and music industry plaques he had received during his lifetime. He often appeared on Family Feud whenever the program did charity driven episodes featuring country music personalities. On some of his early to mid '80s albums he tells stories about his appearances on the game show.

Jerry Clower: 1926-1998.

Charlie Douglas...

I couldn't let 2011 slip by without making mention of Charlie Douglas. A lot of you blog readers probably won't know who he is but some might...depending on where you live. Charlie, who passed away on Thanksgiving Day this year, was a famed disc jockey from the late '50s through the mid '90s. Aside from the career in radio he also became equally popular for his comedic stories. Charlie's biggest impact on radio came on WWL radio in Louisiana as the star of an all-night truckers show titled "The Road Gang". He was at the helm of this radio program from 1970 until 1983...from WWL he made his way up North to Nashville's WSM and remained on their airwaves through 1995. I first heard of Charlie Douglas by way of Jerry Clower! I have all of Clower's main comedy albums from his first one in 1971 on through his final one in 1998. It's on a 1975 comedy album from Clower titled Live At Picayune where you'll hear Charlie bring out Jerry Clower to thunderous applause. So, yes, a 1975 comedy album from Jerry Clower is where I first heard the name and heard the voice of Charlie Douglas!

As luck would have it I was also an avid listener of our own local all-night truckers show...but I knew nothing of Charlie's legendary radio career at the time. One night the local DJ played a comedy record about a bugle and a mule...the actual name of the story is "The Plantin' Bugle". It was rather funny...hysterical in places. Some time later the DJ played the story that for Charlie Douglas was his most requested...the one about the three-hole privy. Each story is lengthy but the build-up is well worth it. It would not be until I got on-line in 2004 that I was able to look up and research Charlie's career and was stunned to find out that he remained on the radio (at WSM) through 1995...I was stunned because it was around that point in time where I first heard of Charlie via the Jerry Clower comedy album. As you can tell, it was sort of ironic that I was just discovering who Charlie was a few years after he had retired from the radio.

You Tube has several of Charlie's comedy stories and eBay and other places have his celebrated comedy album: Me and Dammit Ray - Longtime Friends.