Evans (kneeling at right) played on KTAL's Circle 6 TV show before joining Johnny Horton's Roadrunners in 1953

What was Jewell like?

 Well, I guess she wasn’t old enough to be like my mother, but she was like a big sister. She took me in like a baby brother. Then again, she took a bunch of us in. She was real outgoing. I never did see how she could keep up that high enthusiasm. I remember asking Bubba Gene Carpenter, “Does Jewell go like this all the time?” He said, “She’ll finally get tired and come down a little bit, but she can go for long periods of time.” Usually, a person that’s real outgoing can’t last a long time. I asked that question whenever we were out at the fairground. She’d get people’s attention, and she’d keep it. Like Smiley Burnett – he hung on to every word she said. Of course she’d booked him in, but it was not just because he was working for her.

"Fast-moving, outgoing"

She had a real enthusiastic spirit. When she talked, people listened. Her enthusiasm. What seemed so funny, your dad was laid back. He was a John Wayne type. He reminds me, thinking back, he had a slow-going John Wayne personality. He never got excited. He was very deliberate, and Jewell was outgoing, fast-moving. I guess opposites attract. The main thing is that Jewell was enthusiastic. She never did take anything low-key. She was somebody you didn’t mind introducing, because she’d make a good impression. Like I said, I wondered how she could keep it up over a long period of time. I guess it was just her engrained personality.

The other thing, when you were at her house, you were the guest and she was the host and she couldn’t do enough for you. She had to have everything you wanted. If you were thirsty, you had to have a glass of tea or something. When we’d practice over there, she’d fix us sandwiches, iced tea, Kool-Aid.

Bud's Bar, Big Money

She was pretty tolerant. I remember when Bubba Gene and I started playing at Bud’s Bar, she knew neither one of us drank. She worried about us a little bit, but she’d say, “I’m not gonna try to tell y’all what to do, but just be careful.” She wasn’t thrilled about us playing down there ’cause that was a rough place. It had a big dance floor. You could make more money down there than anywhere around here that you could play. You basically played for tips. The oil fields were active then, and we’d have a lot of oil field workers come down there to let down for the weekend, and when they requested a song, they wouldn’t throw 50 cents in the till, they’d throw five dollars. We couldn’t believe it. We’d come home with 50 dollars a man minimum and sometimes a hundred dollars, and that was pretty good in 1950-51.

I don’t think Jewell ever had affiliation with KALT. She had affiliation with all the stations here though. Casey Strong was a DJ for two stations – KTFS and KCMC, and she was hooked up with Les Eugene. He died about four years ago, and he was real close to her. I was trying to remember what her TV affiliation was. I know she had one. I don’t remember if they ever had anything that she had an active part in other than offstage.

The Hayloft Jamboree

But I know that at the Hayloft Jamboree she was front and center. She introduced it to the -- she told Casey Strong, “Casey, the Athletic Commission wants me to welcome the crowd, but I want you to do it, and I’ll just help you.” He was well-loved, and he had a following of his own. The picture you see, they were like a Brooks & Chase TV thing. They were standing there at the mic, and they told the whole … he asked Jewell questions about how did this come about. She’d say, well, the Texarkana Athletic Commission wanted to do this and that and asked me if I could get some of the Hayride people to come down. And she did. 

She had a whole truckload of Hayride -- you saw the picture: Red Sovine, Johnny (Horton) and the Carlisles and the whole bit. Billy Walker. 

It was in ’54 that Elvis came (to the Hayride). I was probably the first musician he met backstage ’cause I was there (in the musicians’ dressing and rehearsal room), tuning my guitar.

He came in with his guitar and said, “Aren’t you one of the steel players?”

I said, “Yeh. I’m Jimmy Evans. What’s your name?”

"You wouldn't know me"

He said, “You wouldn’t know me.” I said, “What’s your name?” He was a real clean-cut kid.

“You wouldn’t know me. I’m from Memphis.”

Again I said, “What’s your name?” He said, “Presley. Elvis Presley.”

I said, “Yeh. I been hearing your record on KCJJ.”

He said, “Really, that’s not a record release. That’s just a demo. I went and paid for that myself and made that, and I sent it for an audition. I’m trying out for the Hayride. I don’t think I’ll make it, but they’re giving me an audition.”

We got acquainted right off the bat. We (Hayride staff musicians) were rehearsing on that south end – no, actually we had the north end of the stage was where our dressing room was and rehearsal room, and the south end (on the other side of the stage) was where all the big guys were.

We were down there off to one end. He come back and said, “Would y’all mind if I left my guitar in here? I don’t want somebody to step on it. I couldn’t afford another one” – a big Martin guitar. “Would it be OK if I hung my suit in here on the clothes rack?”

We said yeh. So he come in, and we were practicing, and he was standing outside the door, slappin’ the wall with his hands, and the guitar player, Gene, said, “Hey, kid, you want to come on in here?”

He said, “You really don’t mind?”

“Naw, come on in.” so he came in and sat down and said, “I’ll be real quiet. I won’t bother anybody.”

So he sat down and was listening, still playing bongo on his guitar case. He’d look up and say, “Am I bothering y’all?”

“Naw, you’re doing fine.”

"I'm comfortable with y"all"

He said, “Look, I’m comfortable with you guys over here. Scotty and Bill” – that was his band – “they’re over there mixin’ with all those stars. I don’t know how to talk to those stars. I’m comfortable with y’all. Can I just hang out with you guys?”

We said yeh. He became like one of us. All the time we were there he shared a dressing room with us – from his first night on until we left. We got to know him better than anybody.

Texarkana steel guitarist Jim Evans (at left on Hayride stage in photo above) was the key source for this website. He was in many top artists' bands, played three separate stints for the Louisiana Hayride and invented the legendary Evans amplifier. He talked during our Aug. 11, 2011, interview and in emails about how he got started.

In 1951, I was playing the little KALT Jamboree at Atlanta (Texas), a Saturday radio show down there, and the guys that later became big – Norm Baile went to the hayride as an announcer – and I met this kid named Carl Daugherty, a guitar player.

He already had friends at the Hayride, and he’d set in a couple of times. And I said, “Carl, how do you crash that thing?”

He says, “I’m gonna send you straight to the lady that can introduce you. Her name is Jewell House.”

While I was waiting, I came home and told Bubba Gene Carpenter (a Texarkana friend and guitarist who played many jobs with Jim). Bubba Gene said, “I know Jewell. Her husband, Charlie House, is a policeman. I know both of them.”

Meeting Jewell

He carried me over and introduced me to Jewell. She said, “Listen, if you guys want to start practicing, you can come over here and practice.” We had (Gene) and me and a singer named Al Deeton. We’d go over to your house, and your mom would usually sing several songs with us.

She looked after us like her own kids. She’d make tea and cookies and sandwiches for us. Your dad was not a musician but was equally supportive. I suppose they took half a dozen or so of us in like ball team coaches. You must’ve been 5 or 6 years old. This was about ’51. Your brother’s younger. I remember y’all were real small.

Meeting Hayride stars

I still hadn’t started on the Hayride, but Jewell -- I came over (to Jewell’s house) and met the Wilburns and all that, but (Red Sovine’s steel guitarist) Shot (Jackson) was the only one I talked to at any length. Later on, when I went to the Hayride, (Jewell) didn’t have to get me on, but she told me all the ropes, all that was going on down there.

Connections fell into place, Evans said.

I met a man named Tom Collins, not the singer Tommy Collins, he’s the producer. Bubba Gene and I were at the Wagon Wheel -- an outdoor thing (in southeastern Oklahoma), a skating rink made into a dance hall outdoors. We were up there to listen to a band and they asked us to set in, and we did.

This producer, Tom Collins, had a fiddler named Wayne Dobson featured as the “Fiddlin’ Farmer.” He was on the Hayride already. He set in. We set in. We said, “Hey, Tom, why don’t you bring your fiddler down to Rodessa (Louisiana) -- Bud’s Bar -- tomorrow night?” This was like Friday. We were gonna be there Saturday.

Door to the Hayride opens

We didn’t think he’d take us up on it. Sure enough, here they come down there. Of course, your mom wasn’t too thrilled about us playin’ the bars. She didn’t say too much. She just said, “Don’t y’all get off and get to drinkin’.” We didn’t drink with them actually. We just played.

They came down there and Tom said when he set in -- it was intermission and we were sittin’ there drinkin’ a Coke -- and he said, “Jim, would you be interested in playin’ on the Hayride? I said, “Oh yeah.”

I went down and talked to the producer one time after I’d talked to Jewell, and they didn’t have any openings, and he said there’re some now, and if you want to play, I can get you on. I was sittin’ there thinkin’, “Yeah, right.”

He said, “In fact, there are two openings. Do you have a friend who plays steel?” I said, “Yeah, I do – (Texarkana steel guitarist) Jay Riley.”

So I went home and told Jay about it. We all had a big laugh about it. I said, “Can you believe he said he’d get us an audition Saturday?” So we went down there. Some more friends went with us – Ray Ennis, a pretty good guitar player here now – and Bill Brooks, one of the singers. We had a radio show that we played on with him.

They went with us, and we all joked all the way down there about the guy wouldn’t be there and probably wouldn’t know anybody there.

"They're ready for you"

We pulled up in front of KWKH. One of them said, “Is that him?” And it was. He was in a suit. A suit and tie. I said, “That sure is.” He saw us and he said, “Hey, you guys, they’re ready for you. Have you got your steel guitars?”

That kind of shocked us. We said well, yeah, so we went up the staircase to the studio. And the studio, it wasn’t exactly (walled with) one-way glass, but you could see better in than you could see out.

We set up and played. The people auditioning us were outside. I hadn’t met (Hayride bassist and producer) Tillman Franks, Billy Walker, any of them.

Tommy Hill (Hayride artist) -- they introduced us to him ’cause he played rhythm for us and told us what he was going to try to see if we could play. We were nervous, naturally, but still laughing about the fact that it was real.

We said, “We’ll never make this.”

"OK ... you're hired"

Mr. Collins came in and said, “OK you’re both hired. He said, Jim, you’re with a guy named Billy Walker. He’s new on the Hayride, and Jay, you’re with Tommy Trent. He’s got a road show, and his steel player’s leavin’.”

So we both went to work on the Hayride.

Evans learned some lessons right off the bat.

My first night there, I borrowed Jay’s steel guitar ’cause he had a triple-neck Fender, and I had a little single-neck Gibson on a stand.

I was slow about learning about which switch to turn on, and I was supposed to kick Billy Walker off on “Back Street Affair,” and I was still messing with the switches and finally he said, “Well, I’ll just kick it off myself, so he just started singing.

Finally, I got in with him going on it, and when we left the stage he said, “You know, I can’t have this. I’m new here. I’ve got a lot hanging in the balance. When I go on again, I’m gonna take Felton Pruitt on with me, the staff steel man.”

I said, “OK, I understand.”

Tillman Franks to the rescue

So we were sittin’ back there, and I thought that was the end of me on the Hayride. A man came in and said, “I’m Tillman Franks, and I need to go ahead and pay you for tonight’s performance.”

I said, “You don’t owe me anything. Billy just fired me.”

He said, “Billy can’t fire you. He works for me just like you do.”

I told him what happened.

He said, “Well, you got it lined out?” I said yes. He said, “Well, you go on with him again. I’ll talk to him and tell him you’re going on with him.”

So next set when he went on, I kicked him off like I was supposed to. He said, “I need to introduce all of y’all in the audience to my new steel guitar player, Jimmy Evans.”

So he’d changed his attitude after Tillman talked to him. We got along OK after that. That was early ’52.