A Family Business
While radio was our main interest, the family also traveled about the Carolinas making appearances at schools, theaters, churches, conventions, singings, and rallies.
Certain duties emerged for different members of the family. Mother, of course, saw to it that we were fed and clothed properly. Dad helped to arrange for the various programs and engagements. I became closely identified with him in business arrangements for the family.
After moving to Charlotte, Dad opened his first bank account, but arranged for me to sign his name on the checks as well as make the deposits and withdrawals. Regardless of who earned the money, all that we received went through this account. Moreover, I became the "father" in matters of pocket change and allowances!
Betty's role in the family was largely confined to helping Mother with the cooking, clothes, and housekeeping. Bob and Jim did their share of bringing in the wood and helping to keep the place clean. Though our belongings were meager, they always looked good. Combining school with professional work made for an interesting life. We were always anticipating some new show or appearance.
I ended up helping Larry Walker plan the programs and give hand signals during the broadcasts. As stated earlier, we could adjust numbers, padding or cutting, to meet time requirements with little difficulty by giving the proper signal. Bob doubled with Dad on bass and Jim sang top tenor. If some part were too high or too low for one of us, we'd point to another family member and change parts at the end of a phrase. The listener would never know the difference.
Once when Gene Autry came to town, my brothers and I were hired as back-up singers to augment the music on his Sunday evening program, Melody Ranch, over CBS. That six-thirty appearance proved to be not only musically challenging but also financially helpful, with a large talent check going into the family account for our services. My brother Bob remembers Autry giving each of us a new bicycle as a bonus.
When we moved to Charlotte [from Lincoln County] on November 13, 1942, Dad enrolled all of us at Paw Creek High School, about four miles southwest of our home. Excepting those days when Dad took us out for a broadcast or appearance, we rode a bus to school. Although county schools were generally considered inferior to city schools, Paw Creek was noted for its excellence. My brothers remember the traveling minstrel shows which came regularly to our school.
Today, the artist cards in the Columbia Records archives show that between 1946 and 1953, the family recorded a total of fifty-two songs on twenty-six different 78 rpm records. In addition to the singles released, we had EP's (extended play) and albums that included selections from the 78's and Betty's solos.
In looking over old royalty statements recently, I was interested to see that our best-selling records were the early ones. At our initial session in Charlotte on April I, 1946, we cut eight sides. A royalty earnings summary from Columbia, dated 06-30-47, shows that "Cabin in the Valley of the Pines" and "I'll Reap My Harvest in Heaven" sold 59,934 records. "Sunday Morning in Dixie" and "He Put the Sunshine in My Soul" sold 33,062 copies. Our royalty check for those two records alone came to $1,673.94.
With the added income from record sales, Dad proceeded to purchase thirteen acres of land from "Goat" and Cora Taylor. The tract lay behind Oakdale Elementary School, at the end of a dirt road overlooking an artificial lake. Mother and Dad insisted on calling the road Possum Walk—the name of the old Pleasant Grove Road. We built a lovely three-bedroom house, with a full-sized basement and patio.
When the family broke up in 1951, the house was almost paid for. The final payment was made in 1954, thanks again to the common bank account and faithful work by Bob, Jim, Betty, and my parents. During this particular period, I was involved with my college work and a student pastorate.
During the thirteen years of our entertainment career, we went through three different name changes. We started out in 1938 simply as the Johnson Family.
A new station manager who came to WBT from the North in the early 1940s thought that "Ma" Johnson's Family had a more commercial tone and would draw, no doubt, upon the popularity of another radio celebrity named "Ma" Perkins. The new name lasted only a year or so and was carried on several promotional pieces, but none of us ever liked it. By the mid-1940s, the Johnson Family Singers had evolved, and the name remained with us for the rest of our career.
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| Jim, Bob, Red, Betty, Ma and Pa going to radio broadcast, 1950. (Courtesy Kenneth Johnson) |
The most lucrative contract of our singing career was a regional CBS program sponsored by the Quaker Oats Company. The program had no name as such. We simply referred to it as our "Quaker Corn Meal Program:' Larry Walker was pianist for these shows, assisted by Arthur Smith on the guitar. Ken Tredwell was the producer. Dad is credited with composing the theme song, but it was actually written by Larry Walker. The program opened with a rhythmic guitar introduction, followed by the piano and the family singing our signature song:
When the family gets together 'round the old log cabin,
The sound of voices singing fills the air;
When they start to harmonizing 'round the old log cabin, You'll never find a worry or a care.
We had other family network shows that originated from WBT but, for the most part, they were broadcast without sponsorship. These paid minimum wage, whereas the Quaker shows brought us around three hundred dollars a week, a far cry from the ten-dollar weekly salary in the early 1940s! The Quaker series started in January 1950, and concluded in May 1951, when the contract was suddenly canceled because of Quaker's decision to shift its advertising budget from radio to newspapers.
Throughout our career at WBT our agreements with management had been verbal until the Quaker Oats shows, when we signed a contract with Richard Maxwell of Geruth Enterprises, New York, to be our manager. This management arrangement didn't go well with WBT officials, but it did result in additional income for the family. In retrospect, I suspect both the family and station officials would have been happier if we had simply continued with our verbal agreements.
