Biography
Born on 18 February 1916 near Asheville in Yancey County, North Carolina, Boone earned primary recognition through his compositions yet also sang and demonstrated notable skill on guitar. During the middle 1930s he performed in Cliff Carlisle’s ensemble over WWNC Asheville and cut sides with the same group for Bluebird and Decca. On 3 June 1938, billed with Leon Scott as the Elk Mountain Boys, he laid down ten Decca tracks in Charlotte that featured numbers such as “Don’t Dig Mother’s Grave Before She Is Dead” and “I’m Just A Drunkard’s Child.” After a stint at WCHS Charleston alongside Carlisle, he moved back to Asheville in 1939 and teamed with Carl Story, an alliance that lasted nearly three decades. Following U.S. Navy service in World War II, he rejoined Story’s Rambling Mountaineers, working chiefly around Knoxville. With that outfit he contributed guitar or bass to numerous Starday, Mercury, and Columbia sessions while supplying harmony vocals and occasional leads. To supply the comic relief then demanded of every group, he invented the Homeless Homer persona. In 1949 Mercury issued solo recordings by Boone that featured instrumental support from Jethro Burns and Homer Haynes of Homer and Jethro plus Anita Carter. Although he maintained occasional appearances with Carl Story into the mid-1960s, Boone joined the staff of WBIR-TV Knoxville and remained a regular on the daily Cas Walker Show until its conclusion in 1983, after which he turned his attention to fishing and withdrew from professional activity.
Among the many pieces he authored are “You Can’t Judge A Book By The Cover,” “Have You Come To Say Goodbye,” “Heaven’s My Home,” “Why Don’t You Haul Off And Get Religion,” and “Wedding Bells.” The last of these, however, was acquired outright from Arthur Q. Smith for twenty-five dollars; it had already been recorded for King Records in 1947 by Bill Carlisle. Once the song became a major success for Hank Williams as well as for Margaret Whiting and Jimmy Wakely, the investment proved shrewd, and Boone later remarked that royalties from it financed construction of his retirement residence. MCA Japan subsequently reissued “Don’t Dig Mother’s Grave Before She Is Dead” on the anthology Old Timey Music (VIM 4013).
Among the many pieces he authored are “You Can’t Judge A Book By The Cover,” “Have You Come To Say Goodbye,” “Heaven’s My Home,” “Why Don’t You Haul Off And Get Religion,” and “Wedding Bells.” The last of these, however, was acquired outright from Arthur Q. Smith for twenty-five dollars; it had already been recorded for King Records in 1947 by Bill Carlisle. Once the song became a major success for Hank Williams as well as for Margaret Whiting and Jimmy Wakely, the investment proved shrewd, and Boone later remarked that royalties from it financed construction of his retirement residence. MCA Japan subsequently reissued “Don’t Dig Mother’s Grave Before She Is Dead” on the anthology Old Timey Music (VIM 4013).