Ernest V. “Pop” Stoneman (elected 2008)
Born: May 25, 1893 - Died: July 14, 1968
Career Achieved National Prominence Prior to World War II
Photo: Courtesy of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum Ernest V. “Pop” Stoneman was born May 25, 1893 in Carroll County, Va., near the communities of Iron Ridge, Monorat and Fries to a lay preacher and his wife. His mother passed away when he was just three years old, leaving the young Stoneman and his brothers to be raised by his father and three cousins.
The family bonded together through music, especially the traditional songs of the Blue Ridge Mountain inhabitants. Music was an important part of Stoneman’s life, and he was always writing and performing songs. He learned to play every instrument on hand at family musical gatherings and became proficient on the harmonica, guitar, mouth harp and clawhammer banjo. The autoharp, however, was his best known instrument. When he couldn’t afford to buy one out of the Montgomery Ward catalogue, the industrious Stoneman built his own with parts salvaged from an old piano.
While working as a sweeper at a cotton mill in Fries in 1914, Stoneman recorded a song on a home recording machine owned by a friend. This experience would be his first step toward a career in music.
In addition to being a sweeper, Stoneman worked a variety of odd jobs as a young man, including serving as a farm hand and carpenter, while also performing music at local dances. In 1918, he married Hattie Frost, who was also a musician and played both the banjo and fiddle. Through the course of their marriage, the Stonemans became the parents of 23 children, 13 of whom survived to adulthood.
After listening to a record by singer Henry Whitter in 1924, Stoneman was convinced he could deliver a better performance. Going to New York City that year, he cut two songs on the Okeh label. His first single “The Sinking of the Titanic,” which he also wrote, charted at No. 3 on the Billboard and Variety charts and remained there for 10 weeks. The song was one of Country Music’s earliest records to sell more than a million copies and became one of the biggest hits of the 1920s.
During this time producer and future Country Music Hall of Fame member Ralph Peer guided him through many studio sessions for several record labels, including Okeh and Victor. Between 1924 and 1929, he recorded more than 200 songs. In 1926, Stoneman added his wife and adult family members to his band, giving him a full string band sound and establishing a precedent of working with his family that would continue throughout his career.
Stoneman convinced Peer to travel to the Bristol, Tenn. area and audition talent in 1927. This led to the historic Bristol recording sessions, arguably the most important event in the history of Country Music. These sessions featured future Country Music Hall of Fame members Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family making their debut commercial recordings, which launched their careers on a national scale. Stoneman and his wife Hattie were the first artists to be recorded at these sessions.
When the Great Depression hit, Stoneman lost everything. In 1932, he and his wife moved their children (who were performing with their parents and in their own groups) to Washington, D.C., where Stoneman worked odd jobs while suffering extreme poverty. He eventually gained employment at the Naval
Gun Factory in 1941 and bought a lot in Carmody Hills, Md., where he built a house for his family.
During this time he continued to perform as he worked to revive his musical career. After years of struggling, the Stoneman Family won a talent contest in 1947 hosted by local radio and television personality (and future Country Music
Hall of Fame member) Connie B. Gay at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C. First prize was six months of appearances on Gay’s Country Music television program, which was broadcast in eight states in the region.
1956 proved to be the turning point. That year, Stoneman, known by then as “Pop,” won $10,000 on the NBC television quiz show “The Big Surprise” and the producers allowed him to perform on the broadcast. Around the same time, the Blue Grass Champs (a band featuring three of his children: Scott, Donna and Jimmy) won “Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts” on CBS. After that, folk musician/folklorist Mike Seeger recorded Stoneman, his wife Hattie and their children for the Folkways label.
Stoneman’s retirement from the Naval Gun Factory in the late ‘50s allowed him to be fully devoted to the music career he shared with his children. The Stoneman Family recorded several albums in the early ‘60s for
the Starday and World Pacific labels. They toured extensively across the nation, including performances at folk festivals and Disneyland, while making occasional appearances on network television shows that included “The Jimmy Dean Show” and “The Hollywood Palace,” both on
ABC.
The Stoneman Family debuted on the Grand Ole Opry in 1962, and moved to Nashville in 1965. Soon after they signed with MGM Records and hosted a syndicated television series, “Those Stonemans.” The group achieved their first
Top 40 hit with “Tupelo County Jail” in 1966, followed one year later by the Top 30 hit “The Five Little Johnson Girls.”
In 1967, the Stoneman Family was the first recipient of the CMA Vocal Group of the Year Award. That same year they also appeared in two movies: “The Road to Nashville,” alongside other Country Music artists and personalities that included future Country Music Hall of Fame members Bill Anderson, Mother Maybelle Carter (of the Original Carter Family), Johnny Cash, Ralph Emery, Waylon Jennings, Webb Pierce, Marty Robbins, Hank Snow, Porter Wagoner, Kitty Wells and Faron Young; and “Hell on Wheels,” again with Robbins.
In the middle of all this success, Stoneman’s health began to fail. He continued to record and perform through the Spring of 1968, but passed away on June 14, 1968 at the age of 75.
Just as he would have wanted, his children continued his musical legacy. His daughter Patsy re-joined the Stoneman Family and the group carried on, charting a Top 50 hit with “Christopher Robin” in 1968. The band was nominated for the CMA Instrumental Group of the Year Award that same year. A few years later, the group recorded several songs for the soundtrack to “The Country Bear Jamboree” attraction at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla. Throughout the ‘70s and ‘80s, the Stoneman Family underwent several personnel changes before easing into retirement. Group member (and Stoneman’s youngest daughter) Roni Stoneman also became well-known, as a banjo player and as a regular performer on the successful syndicated television series “Hee Haw.” The remaining Stoneman children still perform individually and together on occasion. The Stoneman Family remains the longest continually performing family act in Country Music and the proud legacy of Ernest V. “Pop” and Hattie Stoneman.