Music Banter - View Single Post - The History of Fortune Records
View Single Post
Old 08-23-2014, 08:42 PM   #10 (permalink)
Lord Larehip
Account Disabled
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Posts: 899
Default



In rural Kentucky, Betty Jack Davis and Mary Frances Penick, the daughters of impoverished dirt farmers, loved to sing together having been greatly influenced by the Carter Family. Mary decided Penick was not a good show business name like Davis was and so they called themselves the Davis Sisters even though they weren’t related. Mary wanted a very distinctive name and so called herself Skeeter. The Davis Sisters sang at whatever events they could get hired at in the Lexington area. Eventually, they came to the attention of radio promoters and were invited to perform on the air all over the Midwest. One program called The Red Apple Club (another source states that the program was called Barnyard Frolics) had the girls perform. The program was on Detroit’s WJR. Somehow, the Browns heard them and signed them to Fortune and got them into a studio. The Davis Sisters recorded their "Jealous Love" single in 1952 which country fans loved giving Fortune its first big national hit. An album of the same name followed and then another called Hits with the Davis Sisters after RCA picked them up in 1953 and produced another hit, "I Forgot More Than You’ll Ever Know," before Betty Jack was killed in a car accident near Cincinnati that same year.

Skeeter was also in the car with Betty Jack and was seriously injured but survived. After two long years of recuperating and dealing with the death of her partner, Skeeter Davis resumed her recording career but as a solo act. She would go on to become one of the biggest female names in country music and is considered on par with Patsy Cline, whom she preceded. Staying with RCA, she recorded some 30 albums with them, some of them produced by Chet Atkins who played guitar for her. She joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1959. That same year she married WSM DJ Ralph Emery but the marriage lasted only five years and left bad blood between them. She was regarded as something of an eccentric and free spirit to most country fans. When the Byrds performed at the Opry in 1968, she was the only one in the crowd to applaud them enthusiastically. When she criticized the police from the stage at Opryland during a 1973 performance, she was suspended from the show for 15 months.

Her career with RCA ended in 1974 and Davis recorded only sporadically after that. In the early 80s, she recorded an album with NRBQ called She Sings, They Play that was surprisingly successful. She married the bassist in 1983. Shortly after, she reconciled with the Grand Ole Opry and began performing at Opryland again and as well as touring overseas. But when her parents died, Davis fell apart. She was then diagnosed with cancer in 1988. She divorced in 1996 and died in 2004. But she left behind an amazing career littered with Grammys and other awards. She blazed the trail for women as Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton, Tammy Wynette and others. She was also made a permanent member of the Grand Ole Opry. She is a true country music legend. But few people know that she got her start from an obscure little independent Detroit label.


Davis Sisters - "Jealous Love" - Fortune Records - 1952 - YouTube
Written by Devora Brown.
Lord Larehip is offline   Reply With Quote