Hack Johnson

At Story’s first Mercury session, on 14 September 1947, probably at radio station WROL in Knoxville, Tennessee, Hack and Clyde Johnson joined Story’s Rambling Mountaineers, with Carl Thacker on electric guitar and Claude Boone on bass. Hack sang baritone on the country number “Who’s That Man (I Saw You with Last Night)?” and in the gospel quartet, with Clyde Johnson singing lead, Story tenor and Boone bass, on “I’ve Found a Hiding Place” and “He’s Waiting There,” issued as Mercury 6068 in November 1947, and on “Keep On the Firing Line,” issued in June 1949. He was also the baritone on “I Heard My Name on the Radio,” with Boone singing lead.

When the band recorded again on 21 December 1947, at Castle Studio in Nashville’s Tulane Hotel with Wally Fowler producing, he is listed as the baritone on “Heaven’s My Home,” “I’m Pressing On,” “I’m Gonna Change My Way of Living,” “The Circle Was Broken” and “I Heard My Mother Weeping.” By the next session, in late 1948 or early 1949, Red Rector and Cotton Galyon had taken over the harmony parts. Story recorded “No End to Heaven,” credited to Hack and Clyde Johnson, on 18 April 1950, and Mercury issued it in August 1950 on the back of “You Can’t Believe Everything You Hear.”