Question: What singer was known as the Texas Troubador?
Answer: Ernest Tubb. Born in 1914 in Ellis County, he grew up on a cotton farm near Crisp and began working for a San Antonio radio station at age 19. He imitated the yodeling style of Jimmie Rodgers before a tonsillectomy forced him to adapt to a deeper singing voice that became his signature.
Tubb’s breakthrough came in 1941, when he released the pioneering honky-tonk song Walking the Floor Over You. During his 50-year career, he frequently performed as many as 200 shows a year and routinely highlighted other artists. He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1965 and died in 1984.
