Hank Snow

Hank Snow stands among Canada's most significant gifts to country music, celebrated above all for the many songs he wrote about life on the move. That emphasis is hardly surprising. At twelve he fled his Nova Scotia household, signed on with the Merchant Marines, and spent the next four years as cabin boy and deckhand. Back on land he absorbed every Jimmie Rodgers disc he could find, began performing locally, and soon built a loyal audience in Halifax. Originally billed as the Yodelling Ranger, he adopted the name the Singing Ranger once his high tenor settled into the rich baritone that defined his biggest records. In 1950, the same year he joined the Opry cast, his own composition “I’m Moving On,” the first of his signature traveling tunes, topped the charts and held the summit for twenty-one weeks. Two further hits, “Golden Rocket” from the same year and “I’ve Been Everywhere” in 1962, underscored his enduring fascination with trains and distant places. Yet Snow was equally comfortable in the ballad form and in rhumba-boogie numbers. Among his strongest ballads are “Bluebird Island,” a duet with Anita Carter of the Carter Family, “Fool Such as I,” and “Hello, Love,” which became a hit when Snow was sixty. He continued appearing on the Opry well into the nineties, demonstrating that his remarkable voice had lost none of its clarity across five decades and confirming his stature as a refined, economical guitarist. A steadfast traditionalist, he ultimately gave far more to the industry than he ever received.

Born Clarence Eugene Snow and raised in Nova Scotia, he went to live with his grandmother at eight after his parents separated. Four years later he rejoined his mother following her remarriage, only to endure repeated beatings from his stepfather. At twelve he escaped that situation by shipping out on a fishing vessel, serving as cabin boy and entertaining the crew with song. Returning at sixteen, he took whatever work he could find while attempting to start a performing career. His mother had passed along a stack of Rodgers records that proved decisive; within weeks Snow ordered an inexpensive mail-order guitar and set about mastering his idol’s blue yodel. He sang throughout Nova Scotia for several years before summoning the nerve to head to Halifax in 1933. There he secured a weekly unpaid slot on CHNS’s Down on the Farm, introduced variously as the cowboy Blue Yodeller and Clarence Snow and His Guitar. The next year the station’s chief announcer, Cecil Landry, urged him to adopt the more Western-sounding first name Hank.

Snow performed steadily in Halifax for three more years, often barely scraping by. He married Minnie Aalders in 1936, and the couple breathed easier when he landed a paid regular on the Canadian Farm Hour network, now billed as Hank the Yodelling Ranger. By year’s end he had signed with RCA Victor’s Montreal branch and cut two originals, “The Prisoned Cowboy” and “Lonesome Blue Yodel.” Those sides launched a decade-long string of Canadian-only hits; in that span he recorded nearly ninety songs. In the early forties he hosted a CBC program originating from Montreal and New Brunswick, then moved to CKCW in New Brunswick in 1944. Around the same time he altered his stage name to Hank the Singing Ranger, his deepened voice having eliminated the possibility of yodelling.

Although already a star north of the border, Snow had yet to crack the American market. He tried repeatedly, appearing on the Wheeling Jamboree, spending time in Hollywood, and touring with his trick pony Shawnee, yet wartime priorities kept audiences elusive. RCA further complicated matters by withholding U.S. releases until he was better known. By 1948 he was performing on the Big D Jamboree in Dallas, where he befriended Ernest Tubb. Tubb leveraged his influence at the Grand Ole Opry to secure Snow an appearance in early 1950; by then RCA had agreed to record him for American release.

His U.S. debut single, “Marriage Vow,” scraped the lower charts at the close of 1949 before vanishing. An initial Opry outing in January likewise drew lukewarm response, prompting thoughts of returning to Canada. Those plans evaporated in mid-1950 when “I’m Moving On” began its climb, eventually claiming the top spot for a full twenty-one weeks. In the twelve months that followed, “The Golden Rocket” and “The Rhumba Boogie” both reached number one, the latter holding for eight weeks and confirming Snow’s arrival as a major artist. Between 1951 and the end of 1955 he placed twenty-four singles in the Top Ten, among them the twenty-week chart-topper “I Don’t Hurt Anymore.” While traveling songs remained his trademark, he also explored country boogie, Hawaiian styles, rhumbas, and cowboy material. By mid-decade he had become a star across the United States, Canada, and much of the world, building an especially devoted following in the United Kingdom.

Around 1954 Snow and Colonel Tom Parker established a booking agency, the same Parker who would later manage Elvis Presley. Snow played an early role in Presley’s career, persuading the Opry to give the young singer a try in 1954. Although that appearance met with disapproval, Snow continued urging Presley toward country material and was dismayed when Parker assumed full control of Elvis’s affairs around 1955. Snow countered the rock-and-roll wave by cutting several light rockabilly sides himself; “Hula Rock” and “Rockin’, Rollin’ Ocean” blended the new rhythm with the rhumba and boogie that had powered his earlier successes. He never abandoned country, however, and continued to reach the Top Ten until 1965 with such hits as “Big Wheels” (number seven, 1958), “Miller’s Cave” (number nine, 1960), “Beggar to a King” (number five, 1961), “I’ve Been Everywhere” (number one, 1962), and “Ninety Miles an Hour (Down a Dead End Street)” (number two, 1963).

In the later sixties Snow’s momentum slowed; he found neither the heavily orchestrated country-pop sound nor the Bakersfield style congenial. His singles now charted lower, though Opry appearances and live shows remained popular. Another major hit arrived unexpectedly in 1974 with “Hello Love,” which climbed to number one. Between that release and 1980 he managed only two additional Top Forty entries, both in the same year as “Hello Love.” Despite softening record sales, his visibility stayed high through concerts and lifetime honors, including induction into the Nashville Songwriters International Hall of Fame in 1978 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1979.

RCA ended its forty-five-year association with Snow in 1981, closing his recording career. He never entered the studio again, yet continued appearing on the Opry into the nineties and devoted considerable energy to his Foundation for Child Abuse. Beginning in the late eighties, Bear Family issued an extensive series of multidisc box sets surveying his entire output. In 1994 Snow published his autobiography, The Hank Snow Story. Late the following year a respiratory illness struck, yet he recovered and returned to the Opry in August 1996. He died on December 20, 1999, at the age of eighty-five.