The Country Classic Show begins at 9 am at 98.1 FM Minnesota’s New Country, online or download our new 98.1 mobile app.  Today we’re featuring Jim Reeves with his smooth velvet voice, he was one of country music’s biggest stars of the 1950s and 1960s.

Reeves was known as “Gentleman Jim.” His songs continued to chart for years after his death July 31, 1964 when his Beechcraft Debonair Aircraft went down in bad weather in Hendersonville, Tennessee near Nashville, he was only 40 years old.

Reeves began to work as a radio announcer and sang live between songs in mid 1940s.  He eventually landed a job as an announcer for KWKH AM radio in Shreveport, Louisiana. It was the home of the popular radio show, the “Louisiana Hayride.” Reeves went on to have a string of country hits. “Bimbo” a number one for three weeks in 1953, “Four Walls” was number one for eight weeks, “He’ll Have to Go” a number one hit for fourteen weeks and “Snow Flake” number two for three weeks followed by “Distant Drums” a number one hit for four weeks.

Reeves married Mary White September 3rd in 1947. They never had any children. Mary Reeves married her second husband Terry Davis.  Mary passed away on November 11, 1999 in a Nashville nursing home.

 

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