Honky Tonk Angel (12 page)

Patsy was worse than the fans about autographs and being photographed with her idols. On December 26, Lee received this letter:

Springfield, Missouri, was home to the “Ozark Jubilee,” the leading Midwest country music show. Broadcast from the 1,200-seat Jewel Theater on radio and, beginning in January 1955, weekly for an hour on ABC-TV, it starred pioneer recording artist Red Foley of Blue Lick, Kentucky, with regulars Wanda Jackson and Leroy Van Dyke.

After her January 1956 appearance, Patsy sat down with Foley, mentor to countless stars. “Red,” she told him, “I got some records out there. I’m working with Jimmy on TV and hotter than a pistol on the Town and Country circuit. I’m doing everything I can and ain’t going nowhere.”

“Well, gal, you sure got it, so just keep singing and you’re gonna get there.”

“But when?”

“If it’s gonna happen, it’s gonna happen.”

Patsy would tell Del Wood and Lee Burrows over and over, “But it sure as hell ain’t happening.”

In Washington and the surrounding area, Patsy Cline was a star. In a March 18
Washington Star
Sunday magazine cover story she was dubbed “the hillbilly with oomph.” Gay was quoted: “Patsy has brought a brand of showmanship and rhythm to hillbilly music that’s as welcome as a cool country breeze in springtime. We call her a country music choreographer. She creates the moods through movements of her hands and body, and by the lilt of her voice, reaching way down deep in her soul to bring forth the melody. Most female country music vocalists stand motionless, sing with a monotonous high-pitched nasal twang. Patsy’s come up with a throaty style loaded with motion and E-motion.”

As her success on the “Town and Country Time” shows grew, Patsy developed quite a following. As far as she was concerned, she was underpaid. “She referred to her contract with Mr. Gay as a Hitler contract,” reported Mrs. Hensley. “Patsy went to him and asked for a raise. He informed her she was being paid more than enough for a woman in the business.”

Gay wouldn’t budge, so Patsy went to Bill McCall. “No problem, young lady. But what are you going to do for me?”

“What do you mean? I’m asking for an advance against my royalties!”

“You don’t have any. Your records haven’t earned one red cent! What about this? In exchange for some ready cash, you sign on for another year to give me time to recoup some of my costs.”

Patsy agreed. When she returned the contract renewal, dated March 30, 1956, McCall sent her $200. Patsy was now tied to Four-Star through September 29, 1957.

Connie B. Gay, according to Dean, wasn’t known for his generosity. “He could pinch pennies. For our package shows, Connie broke down and spent some money. He bought what Patsy and me referred to as the Kidney Buster, an old bus with springs so shot it was like a produce truck. You couldn’t sleep, you couldn’t relax. The only reward was a sore butt! We’d travel eighty-five to a hundred miles in an evening, work till two in the morning and then have to drive home and go in to do the damn afternoon TV show. But it was a living. Two hundred and fifty bucks a week and all the pictures we could sell.”

The headliners had publicity photos of themselves solo and with each other in various poses. These were sold six in a pack for one dollar. It was the only sideline Gay didn’t share in.

In between Patsy’s career struggles, love was suddenly in the air. Friday, April 13, Patsy met Charlie Dick, who was infamous in the area as a flamboyant ladies’ man. Her life would never be the same. “I grew up in Winchester,” Charlie explained. “As Virginia Hensley, I saw her in a play at Handley High but never really knew her. I dropped out at the end of the tenth grade and eventually got a job at the
Winchester Star
⁵
as a Linotype operator.

“Friday nights I went to Berryville, Virginia, about eight miles east of Winchester, to the Armory dances. My friend Bud Armel had a good-time band called the Kountry Krackers. This particular Friday night, I was hanging out and saw this gal go up onstage. Bud introduced her as Patsy Cline. I thought she looked familiar, but the name threw me.

“This was the first time I’d heard her sing and she literally bowled me over. She sang every kind of song imaginable. She was a real belter. Nobody could do a song like Patsy, and I still don’t think there’s anyone who can compare to her. Man, how she moved! Patsy couldn’t stand still. She was all over the place! That’s what made her so great and created the impact she had.

“She not only sang well but was also a knockout. The moment I saw her, I decided I was going to make my move. During the first break I asked Bud who this Patsy Cline was. He said she was a Town and Country regular but was going to be working with him on Fridays.”

Armel cracked, “I probably didn’t say too much because I’d waited long enough to get her and, knowing Charlie, I didn’t want to lose Patsy.” The popular musician and bandleader first met Patsy as Virginia Hensley at age fourteen, when she sang with Winchester’s Don Patton and the Playboys. Later, playing briefly with Peer and the Melody Boys, he worked with her again as Patsy Hensley.

“I formed my own band, the Kountry Krackers, in 1952. Although we played throughout the area, we were Friday regulars at the American Legion dances at the Berryville National Guard Armory. When I heard that Patsy and Bill split, I asked Patsy to sing with us.

“My wife Geraldine and I’d known Charlie for years. Charlie’s aunt and uncle, Pete and Myrtle Braithwaite, were her next-door neighbors on Highland Avenue.”

“Charlie was something!” Mrs. Armel said, smiling. “He was five years younger than me but used to pester the daylights out of me. He gave me an especially hard time when I got my own bicycle. He wanted to ride it and I’d never let him. The more I said no, the more he’d try to drive my resistance down! He came from a fairly poor family and didn’t have a lot of things. Eventually, I gave in. Funny thing, after he rode the bike, he never bothered me again!”

Armel remarked, “Charlie was good at getting into trouble. He was pretty wild and had a reputation for drinking, picking fights, and being a ladies’ man. Patsy tamed him a bit.”

In 1949, when his father committed suicide,
⁶
it fell on Charlie to help support his mother, Mary, and his younger brothers, William and Mel. (A third brother was deceased.) He worked and excelled at various jobs—including selling newspapers and clerking in the
Star
’s mailroom. He graduated to the paper’s composing room, where, because of his speed and accuracy, he became a valued employee.

Mel Dick, forty-five, said, “I don’t have a lot of detailed impressions of Charlie because I was the youngest. When I was a kid, he was already a teenager running around. When he and Patsy married, I was nine. Then Charlie went off to the army and, not long after he got out, they moved to Nashville. We’ve gotten to know each other better later in life and have a good relationship.

“Growing up, William and I were quiet Charlie was the exception. He had so much in common with Patsy, Charlie could’ve almost been a blood relative of hers. They were always on the go and looking for excitement. That’s why they got on so well together.”

That particular April night in Berryville, Charlie was about to meet his match in every department.

“I got Bud to introduce us,” Charlie said, “and Patsy played it cool. I tried talking to her and she didn’t seem interested. I didn’t let that stop me.”

At the next break, he tried again, determined not to take no for an answer.

“Excuse me, Miss Cline, would you like to dance?”

“Thanks, but no thanks,” she replied.

“Just thought I’d ask.”

“I can’t dance while I’m working. Okay?”

“Sure thing.”

The next time Charlie spotted Patsy, she was on the floor dancing. A few minutes later he went up to her again.

“Maybe now you’d like to dance?”

“Hey, didn’t I tell you that I can’t dance while I’m working?”

“Sure you did, but I just saw you dancing with some guy.”

“That guy happens to be my husband!” snapped Patsy.

“Well, excuse me!”

Charlie didn’t let her out of his sight the rest of the night. The following Friday, there she was again.

“Hello, Patsy,” he said politely.

“Howdy, Hoss,” she replied.

“Hoss” really grated on him, but he detected a hint of interest in her greeting. Charlie observed her for a while and decided to give Patsy another shot. She still played it cool.

Charlie was already two weeks more patient than he was with other women. Not seeing Gerald, he approached Patsy a third time.

“Hello, Patsy. Would you like to dance?”

“You don’t take no for an answer, do you?”

“Guess not. I’d like to get to know you.”

“Oh, you would, Hoss?”

“Yeah. My name’s Charlie. Charlie Dick.”

“Nice to meet you, Hoss.”

“My name’s Charlie—”

“I know. Charlie
Dick.”

“That’s right.”

“Well, I call everybody ‘Hoss.’”

“Call me Charlie.”

“Okay,
Charlie.
But it’s against policy for me to dance with the customers. See you around.”

At the next break, Charlie asked Patsy if he could buy her a drink.

“I can’t drink while I’m working.” His spirits were deflated. He wanted to tell her to go to hell. Patsy turned and walked away, then stopped, turned around and said,
“But
if you’d like to go outside for a little fresh air, that would be nice.”

Charlie explained they went to his car and “just sat and talked.” He saw the intense feeling of attraction was mutual. However, he admitted, “When I asked her for a date, I thought she’d say no. But she didn’t.”

The next night Charlie picked Patsy up at her mother’s in Winchester and drove her to the “Jamboree.”

Patsy was dating—among others, Jumbo Rinker. “I’d moved to Baltimore,” Rinker said, “but one weekend in Winchester I ran into Patsy and she told me she and Gerald had broken up. She said, ‘Maybe we can go out sometime.’ I started coming down weekends and we’d go up in this single-engine plane I flew. Patsy loved it. She was a daredevil. Nothing scared her. She loved to laugh and we talked of the old days. It was never anything serious. I guess you could call us music buddies.”

Melody Boy John Anderson noted that Rinker wasn’t exactly an expert aviator. “My wife Frances and me used to run around with Jumbo. I’ll never forget the Sunday, not long after he took Patsy for a ride, he rented a spanking brand new Aero Coupe from George Schrader, the owner of the local airfield. We were at the Winchester Speedway attending the jalopy races. Jumbo took off about five-thirty and only a matter of minutes later, as the races were breaking up, made a left bank over the speedway to observe the goings-on. His left wing clipped a telephone wire and he cracked up in the field across from the track. He broke a leg, had some serious bruises, and totaled the plane.”

Charlie—two years younger than Patsy, cocky, oozing with personality and sex appeal, with a distinct nose, wavy brown hair, and chiseled good looks—immediately became the pivotal object in her life. Patsy and Charlie were totally enamored of each other. Bill, if even remembered, was totally forgotten by Patsy; Gerald was all but permanently put on the shelf.

To anyone who’d listen, Patsy would say, “There’s only one man in my life, Charlie. He’s a man, all man.” Fay reported, “Pat carried on something terrible about Charlie and how he excited her. I’d listen and say to myself, ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. She’s singing another him!’ ”

Patsy described Charlie’s lovemaking techniques in great detail. “He satisfies all my wanton desires,” she told Fay. “Yes, ma’am, there’s quite a bit of life in my man.” Recounting his physical attributes, Patsy bragged to Fay, her hands extended, “Charlie’s bigger than life and twice as hard!”

Fay recalled Patsy telling her that once, when she and Charlie were making love, he called out, “Baby, you take me halfway to heaven.” Patsy yelled, “Hoss, what do you mean, ‘halfway’?”