Grand Ole Opry Superstar and Gennett Recording Artist

“And now Friends we present Uncle Dave Macon, with his gold teeth, plug hat, chin whiskers, gates-ajar collar and that million dollar Tennessee smile. . .take it away Uncle Dave!” --George D. Hay, the “Solemn Old Judge” in the 1940 Republic Picture: “Grand Ole Opry.”

Born in Smartt Station, Tennessee, on October 7, 1870, David Harrison Macon lived eighty years and worked variously as a farmer, produce hauler, lay preacher, ham curer, banjo picker, song collector and comedian. From early 1926 until his death in March of 1952, “Uncle Dave Macon,” as he called himself, was the Grand Old Man of the Grand Ole Opry and its first superstar.

The son of a Confederate Army officer, Captain John Macon, Uncle Dave spent part of his youth living in the Nashville hotel his father owned that catered to itinerant musicians and performers passing through Middle Tennessee. He was taken with these colorful troupers and began playing the banjo himself by age 16.

While still in his ‘teens, Uncle Dave witnessed the murder of his father in the hotel. That traumatic event led his mother to move him and his siblings to a farm in Readyville, Tennessee, where he lived until he married in 1900. He then moved to a new home in nearby Kittrell, where he would live for the rest of his life.

Uncle Dave did not become a professional performer until he was nearly fifty. Before that time he played the banjo and sang as a “busker;” hat on the ground and banjo in hand, in front of the Murfreesboro, Tennessee, court house and other places to earn some change.

His main job was owner and operator of the Macon Midway Mitchell Mule and Wagon Transportation Company. In that capacity he spent twenty years hauling all kinds of merchandise (including his beloved Jack Daniels) between Woodbury and Murfreesboro. His home in Kittrel was halfway between the two towns.

Around the end of the First World War, trucks threatened Uncle Dave’s hauling business. Fortunately, he had already developed his great talents as a banjo-picking minstrel and comedian, and was well-known in Middle Tennessee. He was discovered by a talent scout of the Loew’s vaudeville circuit and was booked, along with Fiddlin’ Sid Harkreader, in Loew’s Birmingham. What was to be a week’s engagement stretched to nearly a month. Uncle Dave’s professional musical career had started.

Uncle Dave was the only professional performer when he joined what was then the “WSM Barndance,” a radio show founded and emceed by George D. Hay, known as the “Solemn Old Judge.” He soon nicknamed Uncle Dave “the Dixie Dew Drop.” That monicker stuck as did “the King Of the Hillbillies,” “the Squire Of Readyville,” and “The Grand Ole Man Of the Grand Ole Opry.”

In addition to appearing throughout the South and Midwest, Uncle Dave, often accompanied by Fiddlin’ Sid, the Delmore Brothers, Sam & Kirk McGee, or his son Dorris, also cut over 350 records for such labels as Vocalion, Brunswick, Gennett, and Bluebird between 1924 (before he was on the Opry) and 1938.

In August 1934 Uncle Dave, accompanied by Sam & Kirk McGee, traveled to Richmond, Indiana, for a two-day session for Gennett on August 14th & 15th. Fourteen sides were cut, including “Thank God For Everything,” “When the Train Comes Along,” There’s Just One Way To the Pearly Gates,” “He’s Up With the Angels Now,” and “Don’t Get Weary, Children.” All of these are signature Macon gospel and novelty songs.

Tempting to Macon collectors are the titles of songs not released from the Gennett session, including “You’ve Been A Friend To Me, “The Grey Cat,” “Tune In On Heaven,” and “The Train Left Me and Gone.”

Another unissued side, “Eli Green’s Cake Walk,” would have featured Uncle Dave on the piano, doing an instrumental he occasionally played on the Grand Ole Opry.

Fortunately, the unissued “Tennessee Tornado” has been found, a test pressing which surfaced at a garage sale in Murfreesboro, with Uncle Dave’s handwriting on the label. (Uncle Dave often gave away the pressings he received from recording companies to his friends in Middle Tennessee.)

In 1940 Uncle Dave and Dorris, along with George D. Hay and Roy Acuff with his Smoky Mountain Boys and Girls, went to Hollywood and made “Grand Ole Opry” for Republic Pictures. The film still is a gem and contains the only known footage of Uncle Dave giving one of his typical performances.

Uncle Dave died in a hospital in his beloved Murfreesboro on March 22, 1952, only three weeks after his last performance on the Grand Ole Opry. Oldtimers in Murfreesboro still remember the traffic jams on all roads into the city for the funeral. Folks lining the road to Coleman’s Cemetery, where he lies, recall the carloads of people heading to the graveside services.

Every July Murfreesboro honors its most famous son with “Uncle Dave Macon Days,” three days of competitions in old time and bluegrass music, clogging and buckdancing. A “Motorless Parade” is held (Uncle Dave hated cars and trucks for putting his mule hauling out of business), and a Heritage Award Winner is named (previous recipients include Roy Acuff, Grandpa Jones, Leroy Troy, Wilma Lee Cooper, and Kitty Wells).

Uncle Dave Macon was one of the first country music performers to be installed in Nashville’s Country Music Hall Of Fame.

To this day Opry members tell stories about Uncle Dave Macon backstage at the “new” Opry House, the Ryman Auditorium, where he performed many times. His influence on old time country music and rural showmanship will never fade away.

Author: Bill Knowlton, "Bluegrass Ramble," WCNY-FM: Syracuse/Utica/Watertown NY. Bill is also an emcee at the annual Uncle Dave Macon Days in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

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