Johnny Cash – Object #5

The Pea Pickers Picayune
Published by Inmates of the Arkansas Department of Correction
Volume 1, Number 41 Box 500, Grady, Arkansas 71644 April 10, 1969

To get the population of Cummins Farm excited takes a bit of doing—-like trying to bend horseshoes with your toes.
The special show here today has the population more than excited—–it has virtually flipped! Imagine! The one and only—the great Johnny Cash bringing his show her to Cummins!
Johnny Cash is as well known in the entertainment field as you can get so who would have dreamed he’d one day perform her on the old Pea Farm?
Johnny has brought luster to the small farmer of Arkansas. He has proved what every man should come to realize–if you have the grit, the world is still yours to conquer.
Not until he was past fourteen did Johnny live in a house with electricity. He spent his boyhood working in cotton patches and other menial farm chores. Military service called and when Johnny left Kingsland, Arkansas he undoubtedly left behind a lonely and frustrating boyhood.
Evidently Johnny Cash never forgets he didn’t always “have it made” for he has one personal philosophy beautiful to hear. It goes: “There are three things you can’t get away from—-loneliness, that certain kind of woman, and God.”
Having performed in England, Germany, Sweden and Scotland….among other lands, Johnny has become a living symbol of “Music Maker for the People” and that is the way he wants it to be.
Johnny also wants the very best talent available for his show….and he has it. Carl Perkins, who wrote Blue Suede Shoes (incidentally, the first of records to be number one in all three fields of music) is a credit to anyone’s show.
The Statler Brothers, Harold and Don, who with Lew DeWitt and Phil Balsley are much much smoothies. Lew wrote the famous song, Flower on the Wall.
Cash’s show has beauty too. The Carter Family is great; Anita, Helen and Mam Maybelle would bring on applause in old Carnegie Hall. Mama Maybelle plays more different instruments than most people could name. Anita and Helen never mention their talent on piano keyboards but both are exceptionally gifted. Neither plays a piano while on Johnny’s show.
When ABC-TV, with Screen Gems are ready to cut loose their premier of the show here at Cummins they should have a dandy.
If the interest shown by the inmates here could be considered a barometer of a success, ABC-TV can begin counting dividends today…….and we’ll all be happy.

With this issue, The Pea Pickers Picayune is one year old. Splicing in extra moments when they were available this makes the forty-first time we’ve scrambled some form of paper during the year. We would like to be numbering this one Fifty-two for at one per week that’s where it should be.
Our masthead has, until this issue, carried the notation “Published WEEKLY……” That will be discontinued only because it is inaccurate. With lickin’ good luck, PPP will continue to be a weekly….but it ain’t guaranteed.