Johnny Horton
| Johnny Horton | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Background information | |
| Birth name | John LaGale Horton |
| Also known as | The Singing Fisherman |
| Born |
April 30, 1925 Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Died | November 5, 1960 (aged 35) Milano, Texas, U.S. |
| Genres | Country music, honky-tonk, rockabilly |
| Occupation(s) | Singer |
| Instruments | Guitar |
| Years active | 1950–1960 |
John LaGale "Johnny" Horton (April 30, 1925 – November 5, 1960) was an American country music and rockabilly singer. Rising to fame slowly over the course of the 1950s, Horton earned great fame in 1959 performing historical ballads, beginning with the song "The Battle of New Orleans" (written by Jimmy Driftwood), which was awarded the 1960 Grammy Award for Best Country & Western Recording. The song was awarded the Grammy Hall of Fame Award and in 2001 ranked No. 333 of the Recording Industry Association of America's "Songs of the Century". His first hit, a number 1 song in 1959, was "When It's Springtime in Alaska (It's Forty Below)".
During 1960, Horton had two other successes with "Sink the Bismarck" and "North to Alaska" for John Wayne's movie, North to Alaska. Horton died in November 1960 at the peak of his fame in an automobile accident, less than two years after his breakthrough. Horton is a member of the Rockabilly Hall of Fame and the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame.
Horton was born in Los Angeles, to John Loly Horton (1889–1959) and the former Ella Claudia Robinson (1892–1966), the youngest of five siblings, and reared in Rusk in Cherokee County in east Texas. His family often traveled to California to work as migrant fruit pickers. After graduation from high school in Gallatin, Texas, in 1944, Horton attended Lon Morris Junior College in Jacksonville, Texas, with a basketball scholarship. He later attended Seattle University and briefly Baylor University in Waco, although he did not graduate from any of these institutions.
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