Wilf Carter
(Deceased)
Wilf Carter was born on Dec. 18, 1904 in Port Hilford, Nova Scotia, Canada. His father was a Baptist minister.
At the impressionable age of 10 he saw a production of "Uncle Tom's Cabin". There was a performer in the show called "The Yodelling Fool" and Carter was smitten with him. And At age ten he saw a Chataugua of Uncle Tom's Cabin and was inspired by the singing and yodeling of a performer known as ``The Yodelling Fool.'' In 1923 he moved west to Calgary, Alberta. He found work as a cowboy and made extra money singing and playing his guitar at dances and "house parties". It was during this time that he developed his own yodeling style, sometimes calle an "echo yodel" or a "three-in-one".
Carter performed his very first radio broadcast on CFCN, Calgary in 1930. Two years later, he was entertaining tourists as a trail rider for the Canadian Pacific Railway. The railroad company promoted horseback excursions into the Canadian Rockies, and Carter was a big hit. So big that in 1933 he was hired to be an entertainer on the maiden voyage of the S.S. Empress of Britain.
However, on the way to the ship he stopped off in Montreal and recorded two songs he had written: "My Swiss Moonlight Lullaby" and "The Capture of Albert Johnson". By 1934 that record was a best-seller. By 1935 he was in New York City, performing on WABC radio. And that same year someone tagged him with the name "Montana Slim," and it stuck.
In 1937 he left New York City and returned to his beloved Calgary, where he bought a ranch . He continued to appear on both American and Canadian radio shows, as well as doing live concerts.
In 1940 Carter was in car wreck and received a serious back injury. He was unable to tour regularly for much of the decade. He sold his ranch in 1949 and moved to a 180-acre farm in New Jersey.
In 1952 he moved again, this time to Orlando, Florida. And he opened the Wilf Carter Motor Lodge. That venture only lasted two years before he closed it.
In 1953 Wilf Carter started touring with his own show called, ``The Family Show With The Folks You Know.'' His daughters, Carol and Sheila, worked with him as dancers and back-up singers. At the Canadian National Exhibition bandstand in Toronto, they set an attendance record when they performed for 50,000 people in one week .
In 1964 he entertained at the Calgary Stampede for the very first time. And he became one of the most requested guests on the TV show hosted by Canadian country singer Tommy Hunter.
In 1972 Montana Slim was inducted into the Songwriter's Hall Of Fame in Nashville, TN. One of his favorite songs, of the many he wrote, was "There's a Love Knot in My Lariat." He wrote the song as he was walking in New York City on his way to perform on the radio, and he performed it on the air that same day.
In 1985 Wilf Carter was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1985.
In 1988 he recorded his last album, "Whatever Happened to All Those Years." He went into retirement soon thereafter, mainly because he was losing his hearing. The next year, he wife Bobbi died of cancer.
Wilf Carter died of stomach cancer at age 91 at his home in Scottsdale, Arizonia on Thursday, Dec. 5, 1996
Anthony Caruso
Anthony Caruso, actor, was born April 7, 1916 in Frankfort, Indiana. He decided early on that he would be in the entertainment industry. So when his family moved to Long Beach, California, when he was ten years old, he began studying to be a singer.
However, it didn't take him long to realize that opera in America wasn't as lucrative as acting in America. And he quickly enrolled in the famed Pasadena Playhouse, becoming a close, personal friend of Alan Ladd.
Anthony Caruso made his film debut in Johnny Apollo in 1939, and with his swarthy good looks, gravelly voice, and winning smile, he was soon in high demand, playing all sorts of ethnic types.
His roles in Western movies included North West Mounted Police (1940), Saskatchewan (1954), Drum Beat (1954), Cattle Queen of Montana (1954), The Boy From Oklahoma (1954), Santa Fe Passage (1955), Walk the Proud Land (1955), The Big Land (1957) and The Oklahoman (1957).
Although Anthony Caruso was in eleven of Alan Ladd films, he missed what would have been his biggest role. Alan Ladd had wanted Caruso to play the sociopathic gunman in the 1953 classic Western, "Shane". The problem was that Caruso was already under contract acting in another film. So that juicy part went to Jack Palance, and it made Jack Palance a major star.
Anthony Caruso's work in TV Western series included appearances on The Lone Ranger, Fury, Broken Arrow, Have Gun Will Travel, The Restless Gun, Zorro, Wanted: Dead or Alive, Death Valley Days, Buckskin, Wagon Train, Laramie, Wichita Town, Maverick, The Deputy, Gunsmoke, Gunslinger, Rawhide, The Great Adventure, The Virginian, The Road West and The Wild Wild West.
By the time Caruso came to The High Chaparral TV-Western as that loveable bandit El Lobo, he was a well-recognized film villain with more than 200 film and television roles to his credit.
CLICK HERE to see the complete filmography of Anthony Caruso.
Nona Kelly Carver
Nona Kelly Carver currently lives in Colorado. She spent most of her life on a ranch helping with sorting, branding, hauling, and driving cattle on horseback or on foot. Following an injury in 1994 that required her to lie flat for six weeks, Nona began to write poetry. Her health has been restored, and she continues to write.Much of Carver's poetry is drawn from her memories of various people who have crossed her path and enriched her life. Her three books are: The Tarnish on the Golden Years, Cowboys, Cookstoves and Catastrophies, and Carver Country Cowboys.
Nona Kelly Carver writes and recites her own poetry and has been in shows throughout Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Texas. She is a member of the Academy of Western Artists and was nominated for best female poet of 2000.
Robert Ormond Case
(Deceased)
Case was born in Dallas, Texas in 1895. He graduated from the University of Oregon, served in World War I, and became a reporter and financial editor for The Morning Oregonian.Then in 1924 he turned to writing fiction. And for the first six years, he sold everything he could write to Western Story Magazine (making $15,000 per year from this one source). Then the Great Depression hit and he was cut, and did not sell anything to anyone for the next ten months.
During his career he sold more than 200 short stories and articles to Collier's, Saturday Evening Post and other magazines. He also wrote 14 books. He collaborated with his sister, Victoria Case, to write two nonfiction works, Last Mountains and We Called It Culture.
Case died in Oakland, Calif. on March 27, 1964. (See his photo & bio in the March, 1956 issue; see his photo and his obituary in the May, 1964 issue of The Roundup.)
Claude Casey
(Deceased)
Claude Casey, actor and musician, was born in South Carolina on Sept. 13, 1912. He formed a Western music group, the Pine State Playboys, in 1938. In 1941 he began broadcasting daily over radio station WBT in Charlotte, SC. He appeared in films with Dale Evans and others in the early 1940's and was a member of the Screen Actors Guild and of ASCAP. Later he worked with Cecil Campbell & the Tennessee Ramblers. He founded radio station WJES in 1961 in South Carolina. Claude Casey died on June 24, 1999.
T. J. Casey
T.J. Casey is a bronc-ridin', calf-ropin' yodelin', singin', cowboy poet and songwriter. And in his spare time . . . . what spare time??
T.J. Casey lives under the Big Sky of Montana, but travels all over America to share the Western lifestyle with audiences large and small.
He is purty, too. Well, sorta. He was selected as a model for the renowned 2002 Quick Draw Competition at the 34th Annual C.M. Russell Auction in Great Falls Montana. T.J. is published in the "Big Roundup," an anthology of the best classic contemporary cowboy poetry in America.
His latest CD, "Blue Montana Skies" features many of his well known songs including "Trickling Water".
While not on the national circuit, T.J. spends his life in the saddle and on the ranch as a real working American Cowboy. He is a certified Veterinarian Technician, and has delivered more calves and doctored more horses than he can remember.
T.J. Casey is a member of the Academy of Western Artists, the Western Music Association, International Association of Fairs and Expos, The Americana Music Association, The Rocky Mountain Association of Fairs, and The Charley Russell Western Heritage Association.
CLICK HERE to go to T. J. Casey's own web site.
Johnny Cash
(Deceased)
Born: Johnny Cash, singer and songwriter, was born on Feb. 26, 1932 in Kingsland, Arkansas. His family was dirt poor. And in his teens he opted to join the Air Force. It was there that he taught himself how to play the guitar.
When he left the Air Force, he returned to Arkansas. He formed a small band and began performing on a local radio station. Then he signed a recording contract with an outfit just a few miles away. It was Sam Phillip's "Sun Records," a label soon to explode with major hits by Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and others.
Johnny Cash abused drugs and alcohol for several years. He was arrested in El Paso for possession of narcotis in 1966. But his second wife, June Carter, is credited with helping him kick those habits and turn to Christianity for peace in his life.
He has won a total of ten Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement Award in 1999 Among his many albums is one called, "Johnny Cash Sings Ballads Of The True West" (1965).
Johnny Cash died of complications from diabetes on Sept. 12, 2003, following the death of his wife in May.
CLICK HERE to go directly to Johnny Cash's official home web page.
Peggie Castle
(Deceased)
Peggie Castle, actress and movie star, was born on Dec. 22, 1927 in Apalachia, VA. This tall and beautiful, green-eyed blonde was having dinner in a restaurant in Beverly Hills, Calif., when a talent scout spotted her. And, as they say, the rest is history.
She appeared in 36 films. Her Western credits included Wagons West (1952), Son of Belle Starr (1953), Cow Country (1953), The Yellow Tomahawk (1954), Overland Pacific (1954), Jesse James' Women (1954), Tall Man Riding (1955), The Oklahoma Woman, and Two-Gun Lady (1957).
Her Western TV credits included appearances on these shows: Cheyenne, Zane Grey Theatre, Gunsmoke, The Restless Gun, and The Virginian. For four years she played the role of Lily Merrill in "Lawman" .
Peggie Castle gave up her movie career 1962, after her fourth year on "The Lawman" TV show. She had developed an alcohol problem which, just eleven years later, killed her at the age of 45. Peggie Castle died of cirrhosis of the liver on Aug. 11, 1973 in Hollywood, CA.
CLICK HERE to see the complete filmography of Peggie Castle.
Craig Chambers
Craig Chambers, cowboy singer and musician, worked as a cowboy when he was a pup. And he learned many cowboy songs from the older folks he worked with during that period. In about 1984 he became a professional singer, performing Western music all over the country.
Woody Chambliss
(Deceased)
Woody Chambliss, actor, was born Woodrow Chambliss in Oct. 14, 1914. He was a native of Lubbock, Texas.
Woody Chambliss will be forever remembered as "Mr. Lathrop," the storekeeper in the TV Western "Gunsmoke". He played that role from 1966 to 1975. His other TV Wester credits included How the West Was Won, Cimarron Strip, Bat Masterson, and The Wild, Wild West.
Chambliss also appeared in the following Western movies: 3:10 to Yuma (1957), Invitation to a Gunfighter (1964), The Wild Country (1971), Cry for Me, Billy (1972), and The Red Pony ( 1973, TV ).
Woody Chambliss died of cancer on Jan. 8, 1981 in Ojai, CA.
CLICK HERE to see the complete filmography of Woody Chambliss.
Tim Champlin
He was born on Oct. 11, 1937 at Fargo, North Dakota, but his parents moved to Lincoln, Neb. when he was just a few months old. He spend 10 years there, then four years at Jefferson City, Mo., before moving to Phoenix, Ariz. He graduated from St. Mary's High School in Phoenix in 1955, then made one more move with his parents to Nashville, Tenn.Champlin received his B.S. in English from Middle Tennessee State and his M.A., also in English, from Peabody College in Nashville, now a college within Vanderbilt University. He married Ellen Hosey of Old Hickory, Tenn., and they have three children--Christopher, Kenneth and Liz.
Champlin writes, "I have held a variety of jobs over the years including file clerk, youth director, lab technician, salesman for Sears, Recreation Resource Specialist for the U.S. Dept. of the Interior, and for several years now a Veterans Benefits Counselor with the Veterans Administration. His hobbies include tennis and sailing.
Champlin is the author of Dakota Gold (Ballentine, 1982), Summer of the Sioux (Ballantine, 1982), and Great Timber Race (Ballantine).
In The Roundup for March, 1983, Tim gave this advice to new writers: "Be patient and persistent. Don't take rejection slips personally (unless some friendly editor gives you a little constructive advice). In ten years of part-time writing I sold a total of 25 articles and short stories to various regional and national magazines. But, in the process, I also collected 477 rejection slips, not counting the 65 negative replies I got for a novelette that never sold. Even Summer of the Sioux was rejected 13 times before Ballantine Books accepted it."
Jackie Chan
Jackie Chan, actor and stuntman and martial arts expert, starred in the 2000 release movie, "Shanghai Noon" (a play on the classic cowboy movie, "High Noon").
Jeff Chandler
(Deceased)
Jeff Chandler was born in Brooklyn, New York as Ira Grossel on December 15, 1918. That Chandler kid grew up to a solid and handsome 6' 4" . He took one drama course after he graduated from high school and acted in a few local plays for the next two years.
He served as an officer in the Army during World War II.
After the War ended, Chandler acted in comedies and dramatic shows on various radio stations. He played Professor Boynton on the radio version of "Our Miss Brooks".
Then the movies came knocking and he signed a contract with Universal Studios. He made his first movie in 1947. And in 1950 he was nominated for an Oscar as "Best Supporting Actor" for his role in the Western film, "Broken Arrow".
Jeff Chandler also owned a publishing company called, strangely enough, "Chandler Music." He even had some success himself as a recording artist. He sang, played the violin and composed music.
Jeff Chandler & Jimmy Stewart in "Broken Arrow" (1950)Jeff Chandler's Western films included "Broken Arrow" (1950), "Two Flags West" (1950), "The Battle at Apache Pass" (1952), "The Great Sioux Uprising" (1953), "War Arrow" (1953), "Taza, Son of Cochise" (1954) and "The Jayhawkers" (1959).
Jeff Chandler was suffering from a slipped disc in his back. So he went into the hospital for corrective surgery. He survived the surgery but died a few days later on June 17, 1961, at age 42, of blood poisoning. His family sued the doctor for malpractice and won a $200,000 judgment. Fellow actor Tony Curtis was one of the pall bearers at his funeral. Chandler's remains are in the Hall of Graciousness Mausoleum in the Hillside Memorial Park in Culver City, CA.
CLICK HERE to visit a Jeff Chandler site, full of photos, at Classicstars.com.
CLICK NOW to see the complete filmography of Jeff Chandler.
Jon Chandler
Jon Chandler received the Medicine Pipe Bearer Award from the Western Writers of America in 1999 for his book, The Spanish Peaks. The book won in the category of "Best First Novel". He has since seen a second novel, Wyoming Wind, published.
Chandler holds undergraduate and M.A. degrees in communications and public relations. Before becoming a full-time writer and musician, he worked in marketing/communications management positions at Darcy Communications, Rocky Mountain Energy and the Mountain States Legal Foundation.
In 1995 his album, Out West of Laramie was a critical success. And 1996's award-winning Keepers of the Flame, sponsored by conservation and agricultural organizations, continues to keep him on the road.
Jon Chandler is a director and past-president of the Hole in the Wall Gang, a Western heritage organization founded by legendary Denver journalist Red Fenwick. He holds memberships in Broadcast Music, Inc., the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists, and the Western Writers of America.
CLICK HERE to visit Jon Chandler's own web site.
Lonny Chapman
Lonny Chapman, actor, was born on Oct. 1, 1921 in Tulsa, Okla.Lonny Chapman's Western credits include appearances on these TV shows: The Oregon Trail, Bonanza, The Virginian, The Big Valley, The Iron Horse, The Guns of Will Sonnett, Gunsmoke, Laredo, and The Rifleman.
Chapman's Western movie credits include appearances in The Dangerous Days of Kiowa Jones (1966, TV), Hour of the Gun (1967), The Cowboys (1972), Running Wild (1973), and Return of the Big Cat (1974, TV).
CLICK HERE to see the complete filmography of Lonny Chapman.
Charles "Bob" Chase
Chase has written several articles for Real West and Old West. He became a pharmacist in 1948 and retired from that profession in 1984.
Karyn Follis Cheatham
Karyn Follis Cheatham was born in January, 1943 at Oberlin, Ohio. She is from an African American and Native American background. She married on July 17, 1965. She and her husband have two children. She is now divorced and living in Montana.
She worked as a research analyst in Columbus, Ohio from 1965-69, then as an executive secretary from 1969-70, and since 1971 as a mom. And since 1975, she has been a freelance writer.
Her writing experiences include editing newsletters in Ann Arbor, Mich. and in Nashville, doing numerous public readings of her poetry and participating in poetry workshops, and doing book reviews. She joined WWA in 1980.
In 1977 she became a founding member of Nashville Writers. And since 1982 she has been a member of Poets & Writers. She is listed in Contemporary Authors. She has published under the names K Follis Cheatham, Kae Cheatham (contemporary and nonfiction), Karyn Cheatham, Long-Neck Woman, and most recently, Arryn Heath (science fiction).
Her book, The Best Way Out, was chosen as a notable children's trade book in the field of social studies by NCSS Children's Book Council, in April of 1983. She is also the author of Bring Home The Ghost (1980), Life On A Cool Plastic Ice Floe (1978), Spotted Flower And The Ponokomita (1977). She also contributed a chapter ("I dream") to I Am The Fire of Time: The Voices of Native American Women.
Cheatham's more recent books include Blood and Bond, Basic Rodeo I, Daughter of the Stone, Dennis Banks, Kansas Dreamer and The Adventures of Elizabeth Fortune.Her fiction and nonfiction articles and poetry have appeared in such magazines as Art/Life, Conditioned Response, The Panhandler, Ripples, Crosscurrents, Sojourner: The Women's Forum, West Wind Review, Spectrum, Akwesasne Notes, Minorities and Women in Business, Knoxville Lifestyle, The Carolina Indian Review, and The Lutheran.
Cheatham moderated a panel at the 1989 WWA Convention in Portland on the subject, "Contributing Cultures". When she is not writing, she enjoys horseback riding and watching, playing and coaching soccer. She holds a U.S.Y.S.A. license to coach youth soccer, and has done so each year since 1982. She has also played league soccer for two years.
Karyn Follis Cheatham is also a proficient bead and leather worker. She owned her own crafts shop for a period and has taught courses on bead and leather work. And she enjoys photography and traveling in the West.
Check out her own web site at: http://www.kaios.com
Roberta Cheney
(Deceased)
Roberta Cheney is the author of Names on the Face of Montana (Mountain Press, 1983), The Big Missouri Winter Count (Naturegraph, 1979), and with Emmie Mygatt Hans Kleiber: Artist of the Big Horn Mountains (Caxton, 1975). She served as president of WWA in 1977-78.
"Windy Bill" Chiles
"Windy Bill" Chiles, musician and songwriter and poet, lives in Idaho. He has more than 100 songs in the archives of the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming and in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
"Windy Bill" Chiles in 1999 was given the "Golden Note Award" for outstanding musician of the year by the Idaho Cowboy Poets Association.
Harry E. Chrisman
(Deceased)
He was born in a soddy on his father's ranch in Custer County, Neb. He obtained his education in the public schools at Broken Bow and Scottsbluff. He then worked as a horse-wrangler, cowhand, telephone lineman, shipping clerk and salesman. He spent three years, 1942-45, in the Pacific Theatre of World War II.
Chrisman graduated from the Rochester (NY) Institute of Technology in 1947, as did his wife, Catherine. They both enrolled at the University of Denver, with Harry studying journalism and Catherine studying interior design. Harry confesses to having a varied background, one which includes life as a hobo, a horse-wrangler, cowhand, telephone lineman, shipping clerk, salesman and newspaper reporter in Liberal, KS. and other places. In 1972 he was awarded the Alumni Achievement Award from R.I.T. The Chrismans have lived at their present address since 1965.
His first book was The Ladder of Rivers, the Story of I.P. (Print) Olive (University of Ohio Press,1962). It was a runnerup in the WWA awards competition at the 1963 Convention. His second book was, Lost Trails of the Cimarron (Ohio University Press, 1964, now in second edition), also a runnerup for the WWA best nonfiction award.
Harry Chrisman is the author of Tales of the Western Heartland (Ohio University Press, 1985), 1,000 Most-Asked Questions About the American West (Ohio Univ. Press, 1982), and rewrote Jim Herron's biography Fifty Years on the Owl Hoot Trail (Chicago: Sage Books, 1969).
The Chrisman Collection is a collection of books written or edited by Harry E. Chrisman and historic items that were donated to the library by Mr. Chrisman. These items include: a buffalo skull, a Sharps hunting rifle, an antique Tarahumara Indian saddle, etc. Mr. Chrisman was born February 7, 1906, in a sod house on a western ranch near Lillian, Nebraska. He went to public school at Broken Bow, Nebraska and graduated from Scottsbluff, Nebraska High School in 1921. On October 20, 1942, he married Catherine Bell in Scottsbluff. Mr. Chrisman joined the Army that year and served with the U.S. Army Infantry, and the Army Port and Service Command in the Pacific until 1945. After the war, he attended the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, and the University of Denver. He was later awarded the Alumni Achievement Award from the Rochester Institute of Technology. The Delta County Independent of Colorado hired him as an ad salesman in 1947. A year later he came to Liberal, Kansas, where he sold ads for the Southwest Daily Times. After retiring in 1965, he moved to Lakewood, Colorado and began writing non-fiction westerns. His first book "Lost Trails of the Cimarron", was published in 1961. His last book, "1001 Questions about the American West", came out in 1982.
During his life he worked as a horse-wrangler, a cowhand, a telephone lineman, a shipping clerk, and a salesman. He wrote eleven books about the West and was a member of the Western Writers of America. Each of his first three books placed second on the Western Writers of America Rating Charts during their years of publication. His friends included western writers Louis L'Amour, Nellie Snyder Yost, and Elmer Kelton.
Harry E. Chrisman died December 17, 1993 at age 87. He was buried at Fort Logan National Cemetery in Colorado.
Julian Ernest Choate, Jr.
Joe B. Frantz and Julian Ernest Choate, Jr., collaborated to produce their classic book, THE AMERICAN COWBOY in 1955. Joe B. Frantz became one of the most prolific scholar and writers on the state of Texas. And Dr. J.E. Choate became a professor at David Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tenn., and wrote a number of religious books.
Margarite Churchill
Margarite Churchill is shown with John Wayne in Wayne's
first starring role, "The Big Trail" (1929).
This listing is far from complete and may contain errors. Therefore, all Western entertainers and/or their agents are requested to submit recommended changes by contacting Stan Paregien through his e-mail address.
I love you, O Lord, my strenth.
The Lord is my rock,
my fortress and my deliverer;
my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge.
--- Bible: Psalm 18:1-2
© 2007 by Stan Paregien, Sr.
