Here we have a disc but an artist that was well-known on the west coast during the late 1940s and early 1950s but slipped into obscurity after his recording career ended. "Cousin" Ford Lewis recorded a string of 78rpm records for Pasadena's 4 Star label, an independent company that secured its place in music history as a hit maker of post-war country music.
As much as 4 Star is well-known still today, Ford Lewis unfortunately did not leave behind as much traces as the record label. I assume he was born not in California, possibly in Arkansas (I could swear I read that somewhere), on June 15, 1917, and came to the west coast in the 1930s or 1940s. I couldn't find any hints to his background, sadly.
However, by 1947, he had relocated to California and had made himself a name as country music performer "Cousin" Ford Lewis. He became also known as the "Wonder Valley Cowboy" due to his theme song "Wonder Valley". During his career, he could be heard on such stations as KXLA (Pasadena, California), KMJ and KFRE (Fresno, California), and KGER (Los Angeles, California).
One of 4 Star Records' executives discovered him while being on the road and signed him to a recording contract. The label was already successful with country artist T. Texas Tyler and signed several more unknown but innovative artists during the next years. Lewis' first recording session for the label took place in 1947 in Hollywood, recording a total of six songs with support by Les "Carrot Top" Anderson and an otherwise unknown band. "Silver-Haired Daddy of Mine" b/w "Judy" from that session were chosen for his debut release (4 Star #1164).
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| Billboard October 18, 1947 |
Apparently, Lewis was not a talented songwriter and had to rely on material by other writers. Already his first release, "Silver-Haired Daddy of Mine", was a cover of the old-time hit by Gene Autry and Jimmie Long from the early 1930s. Some of his releases were considered to be hits, although they never appeared in Billboard or Cash Box charts. 4 Star was selling between 50,000 to 700,000 copies of several T. Texas Tyler releases and each of them was considered to be a hit. The same probably also applied to Lewis' releases, although it is probable that his sales remained in the lower areas.
To boost 4 Star's artists' popularity, one of the label's owners, Don Pierce, taped radio show segments to send them to powerful border town stations like XERB, XELO, XERF, and XEG across the Mexican border. Lewis was among those artists, which definitely increased his popularity.
Lewis recorded such songs as "Juke Box Cannon Ball" (written by Rusty Keefer, recorded by Bill Haley), "Dora" (written by Johnny Tyler), or "Dear John" (originally by Hank Williams). In 1950, Lewis renewed his contract with 4 Star and by August that year, was working with Joe Dean and his San Antonians at Dave Ming's Harmony Corral Park in Anaheim, California. Dean and his band also supported Lewis on his 1950 recording sessions for 4 Star.
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| Billboard August 19, 1950, C&W review |
His last release appeared around August 1950 with a romping cover of Hank Snow's "I'm Movin' On" and "Last Night You Said Goodbye" (4 Star #1510). Both songs were recorded ca. in June that year with Joe Dean's band in Hollywood. An unknown third song was recorded during this session, which remained unissued and seems to be lost. Billboard reviewed the disc in August but had no high hopes for it ("should do okay in the hill country and Southwest").
Apart from a couple of various artists EPs on which 4 Star put Lewis' songs, no more discs appeared by him, neither on 4 Star nor on any other label. It seems that he went out of the music business immediately after his contract ended.
"Cousin" Ford Lewis died on April 10, 1985, at the age of 64 years.
• SecondHandSongs
• "Juke Box Cannonball" and "Don't Bother Me" on the Internet Archive
Sources
• Hillbilly-Music.com entry
• 45worlds/78rpm entry
• Praguefrank's Country Music Discographies entries
• Discogs
• Bill McNeil: "The Armstrong Twins" (Musical Traditions), 1986
• John Broven: "Record Makers and Breakers - Voices of the Independent Rock'n'Roll Pioneers" (University of Illinois Press), 2009, page 281
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