Adron Jumper on Landmark

Adron Jumper - I'd Hate to Be the Man (Landmark 45-102), 1962

Country, gospel, and rockabilly singer Adron Jumper is one of the great unknowns in rockabilly music. He orbited around Memphis for some time and worked with Eddie Bond a few years but he never broke out of the local scene.

Adron Claude Jumper was born on September 7, 1939, just east of Forrest City, Arkansas, in a little town called Palestine. His parents, Homer Dixon Jumper and Christine Grace Dover, had married a year earlier and he was the oldest of six children. Mother Christine was active as a minister in the local Twin Assembly of God Church and she passed on her faith to her children.

Adron Jumper

By the late 1950s, Jumper was active in Memphis, where he met Delores Chipman and married her in 1959. He was a salesman by day but performed music as a sideline. In the early 1960s, he performed frequently at Eddie Bond's Ranch and took also part in his touring shows sometimes. Possibly his first record was on the local Forrest City based Landmark label featuring two gospel songs, "Not a Landmark Left Behind" and "I'd Hate to Be the Man".

His best known disc came out on the vanity Forrest label (possibly his own) featuring "Crawdad Song" and "You Know That I Know". The songs were recorded in 1965 at Roland Janes' Sonic studio with his relatives Kevin and Gene Jumper in the backing band. "Crawdad Song", a reworking of the folk standard "Crawdad Hole", is Jumper's "claim to fame", as its rock'n'roll sound qualified it for release on two Buffalo Bop compilations in the 1980s and 1990s.

He then recorded for Eddie Bond's Stomper Time and G-Zackie labels in 1963, for Shack in 1967, and for another Forrest City label, Twin. Jumper lived all of his life in Palestine and, like his mother, was active in the Twin Assembly of God Church there. Tragic struck in 1966, when his infant daughter Andrea died.

Adron Jumper died on May 25, 2000, at the age of 60 years and is buried at Bell Cemetery in Palestine. A year later, Dave Travis released two of Jumper's Stomper Time recordings on a compilation CD.

Discography

Landmark 101/2: Adron Jumper - Not a Landmark Left Behind / I'd Hate to Be the Man (1962)
G-Zackie GZ-3565: Adron Jumper - The Joker /  Sammy Ardell - If I See You Tomorrow (1963)
Stomper Time ST-101: Adron Jumper - Just a Waste of Time / Someday I Will (1963)
Forrest 101: Adron Jumper & the Wheels - Crawdad Song / You Know That I Know (1965)
Shack 45-201: Adron Jumper - Who Am I / Satisfied / Remind Me Dear Lord / One Day Nearer Home (1967)
Twin TR103: Adron Jumper - The Suns Coming Up in  the Morning / He's Coming Closer Now Than It Has Ever Been

Sources

• Find a Grave entry

• 45cat entry

• Rockin' Country Style entry

• Gospel Jubilee entry