About Me
Sheb Wooley, the winner of the Country Music Association's 1968, "Comedian Of The Year Award," is one of those rare artists who, over the years has consistently enjoyed success in both Nashville and Hollywood.Todd Taylor and Shebwooley Going West Song- To country fans he has perhaps best been known for his million dollar selling novelty tunes like Don't Go Near The Eskimos, Harper Valley P.T.A. ..2 and Fifteen Beers Ago, which were recorded under the pseudonym "Ben Colder." He is also known for his more serious country hits like That's My Pa a ..1 Hit in 1962, and other songs which he recorded under his own name. Along the way however, Wooley who resided in Hollywood from 1950-1979 carved out a second career as an actor. He has appeared in more than 50 feature films. Just a few of the more notables are: "High Noon" with Gary Cooper, and Grace Kelly, (he played the killer Ben Miller). "Rocky Mountain" with Errol Flynn, the "War Wagon", with John Wayne and Kirk Douglas, "Rio Bravo" with John Wayne, "Distant Drums" with Gary Cooper, and Giant with James Dean and Elizabeth Taylor.In more recent years he also landed parts in "Starman" with Jeff Bridges and "The Outlaw Josie Wales", with Clint Eastwood, "The Dollmaker" with Jane Fonda and "Uphill All The Way", with Mel Tillis, Roy Clark, and Burl Ives.From 1959 until 1967 he played the role of Pete Nolan, the Scout in the long running T.V. series "Rawhide." In addition he also wrote several scripts for the series in which Clint Eastwood also got his real start in the film business.In 1969 Wooley was also one of the original members of the cast of "Hee-Haw" the long running country comedy series, for which, he also wrote the theme song that is still used today. He filmed the first 13 segments of "Hee-Haw" before backing out due to other professional demands. He continues to be an occasional guest on the show even today.An often overlooked and somewhat bizarre landmark in Wooley's career came about in 1958 that was the year he wrote Just Another Accident and recorded the song Purple People Eater which swept the nation during an era of intense fascination with UFO's and the Sputnik phenomenon. The record sold over 3 million copies and was certified Gold for a million sales after it was released just 3 weeks. (And 100 Million Copies sold to this date in 1997) Though he has been somewhat less viable in the charts in the past few years. He is still in constant demand for rolls in films and personal appearances, what little time he does have left he has devoted to his continuing activities as a songwriter and recording artist and he continues to write TV and film scripts. Despite the image of the comedic, drawling, laid-back cowpoke that Wooley has nurtured through the years. He seems in real life to be moving about 60 miles an hour in a 30 mile an hour world. He was about as easy to corral for this interview as a herd of stampeding horses. Even as he speaks he is on his way home to grab a quick dinner and pack before leaving early the next morning for a months worth of personal appearances and other personal activities. "I have a show tomorrow night in Fort Worth," he explains as he studies his wristwatch. "Then from there I am going out to Scottsdale, Arizona on business and then on out to California. I have just finished writing a movie script for a horse picture that I am trying to get made. I've got a theme song already working for it as well. I also want to visit my daughter while I'm out there," he smiles proudly. "She just had my first grandbaby about a year ago. Then after I visit with them. I go on up to Seattle, to start a tour of the Northwest. I do about 150shows a year," he adds "mostly Elks Clubs, Moose Lodges, places like that.Wooley also keeps his hand in songwriting as well putting in many hours on the craft during those weeks that he is home in Nashville. He notes however, that the entire practice and procedure of writing songs and having them cut has changed rather dramatically since the days that he was at the top of the charts. "A song like Purple People Eater, was something that I slapped together in about a half an hour at most, and even then, I don't know if it was even a song or not," he recalls." That used to be how you did it, but it sure is different now. I do a lot of co-writing with Dickie Lee and we may spend as long as six weeks working on a song, and still not be sure if we have got it finished or not." He concedes that most of his recent success with his original songs has been on his TV LP packages. "I haven't had that much luck as far as getting other artists to record my songs," he admits. "It's pretty tight out there as far as getting things cut. Especially for the old timers. The business has changed and there is just a whole bunch of different guys doing it these days."Still, when Wooley makes such observations he is not complaining, merely observing. All in all, he acknowledges that his years in the music and film business have been good to him. "I've got a nice home on the lake, and I own several (commercial) buildings around Nashville and Hendersonville. My brother and I have a farm in New Mexico. I've also got some land in California and different places around." Wooley has indeed come a long way since those years when Bob Wills was king of the airwaves and he was just a boy growing up on a farm near Eric, Oklahoma, just across the border from the Texas panhandle. He was born there on April 10th 1921. As a teenager he was a skilled rodeo rider and became quite accustomed to sitting on horses--a skill that later served him well in Hollywood. But even during those years, he was already drawn to music. "I used to go to these old country dances where they had a fiddle and a guitar sitting over in the corner." he remembers. "And I'd sit right there in the corner too. I'd sit right between them so I would get it from both sides," he smiles. "Even back then, music was what I wanted to do."By the time her was 15 he had his own band, The Plainview Melody Boys, and they had their own show on a radio station in nearby Elk City, Oklahoma. In 1945, right after World War II, he left for Nashville with hopes of making his mark as a singer and songwriter."I spent about a year in Nashville," he recalls, "and I pretty much starved. Everybody heard my songs, and everybody seemed to like them. But nobody recorded them. Ernest Tubb encouraged me, though. And Eddy Arnold let me mow his yard. But mainly, they did give me encouragement, which was what I needed more than anything else."Eventually, Wooley did land a spot as a performer on WLAC Radio in Nashville-at 4:45 A.M. "I'm sure everybody remembers," he laughs. "Everybody stays up that late don't they?" In 1945, in Nashville, he also cut four sides at the WSM Radio studios for the Bullet record label. Though two of them were not released until several years later, and the others were never issued, they were none-the-less some of the first records to ever be recorded in Music City. He was later given an additional radio spot at 4:30 p.m. which helped considerably. "I started making personal appearances and pluggin' them over the radio, and things started going pretty well for me then."Wooley left Nashville at this point with the intention of going directly to Hollywood. "Several people in Nashville encouraged me and felt I'd do well there," he remembers. "Particularly the late Jack Stapp, (founder and former Chief executive of the powerful Tree International Publishing Company). "I guess they either thought I looked and acted a lot like a cowboy, or maybe they just wanted to get me out of town!" he laughs. For three years, however, he got sidetracked in Fort Worth, Texas, where he landed a fifteen-minute radio show sponsored by Calumet Baking Powder. He also put his own band together, The Calumet Indians. His show was broadcast over a dozen or so different 50,000 watt, clear channel stations throughout the southwestern U.S., and the resulting exposure soon made him and the band much in demand for personal appearances.In addition to scripting, emceeing, and performing on this popular radio show, in 1974 Wooley also recorded a half-dozen or so sides for the Bluebonnet record label in Dallas, Texas. (Some of Wooley's vintage recordings from this era where recently re-issued by the German Bear Family Record label. The reissue LP, Sheb Wooley: Country Boogies Wild Wooley (BFX 150991is widely available in the U.S.)In 1950, Wooley finally made it to Hollywood, his longtime destination. He was spotted by some talent scouts in a play in which he appeared, and in an amazingly short time he landed a screen test at Warner Brothers Films. As a result, he ended up in his first motion picture, Rocky Mountain starring Errol Flynn. I was lucky, because it's usually not that easy to get screen tests," he recalls. "It just turned out that the timing was right. William Keely (the director) just happened to be looking for some young new faces-and at the time, I had one! "Errol Flynn was a fun guy to work with," he recalls with a grin. "We filmed the movie in Tucumcari, New Mexico, and we were both staying at the same hotel. We both had beards in the picture and we looked surprisingly alike. I had a good time one night. I was sitting in the hotel bar and this travellin' lady came over and said, "Mr. Flynn, I never liked you until I read your book." "You can imagine I did some of my best acting that night I had a helluva time with the Australian accent. Despite roles in acclaimed pictures like High Noon and Distant Drums, the next couple of years were pretty rough going. "Around 1953 there was a lull, and not many roles came along," he remembered. "I wasn't very prolific with my songwriting during that time, either. It got down to where I was just barely making a living. "But in 1954, things turned around again. A song I'd written the year before, called Too Young To Tango, was a million seller for Theresa Brewer. Then Hank Snow did When Mexican Joe Met Jole Blon, and it sold about 400,000copies. And I was back in the chips again.In the late 1950's, right around the same time, came his long-running role in "Rawhide" and his surprise novelty Hit "Purple People Eater". "I first got the idea for Purple People Eater, when this songwriter friend of mine told me his son had come home from school with a joke about a people eater. I wrote the song, just dashed it off as sort of an afterthought. Later I went down to the Beverly Hills Hotel for a meeting with the man who was then head of MGM, my record company to screen some material for my next album. I played him every song in my guitar case, until I got to that one, which was the bottom of the barrel." "After I recorded it, MGM didn't want to release it," he continues. "They said it wasn't something they wanted to be identified with. The company did have a lot of pride at the time," he adds cynically, "even though they were losing their rear ends, financially." "But then an acetate of it found its way to the company's New York offices, and these young people up there would start gathering around listening to it. Pretty soon, it got to where, every lunchtime, there'd be forty or fifty of 'em up there, playing the thing over and over. Finally someone in MGM's front office saw what was going on and they reconsidered and released it. It took off and just went crazy."Looking back, a listener can't help but wonder just what inspires or compels a farm boy from eastern Oklahoma to leave home at a young age in the first place to take on both Nashville and Hollywood, where he's since carved out such an unusual and varied career. Surely, it took a great deal of self-confidence, above all else."Yeh, I guess it did take a lot of nerve," he grins, as he considers those early years. "But, that's not to say it didn't frighten me! I was so nervous the first time I sang on the radio in Nashville that my voice went up a half a tone! But if you've got something in life you really want to do, somehow you've got to figure out a way to overcome that fear." And his unbounding energy, which becomes obvious once again as he fidgets in his chair, sneaks a look at his watch and considers the month-long journey ahead of him, is certainly another facet of his unusual personality that has served him well over the years. "I believe success lies in three things," he concludes, "dreams, hard work, and faith. You've got to dream the dream, do the work, and have the faith. Success can't resist that kind of formula."
