60 YEARS AGO TODAY:
2/4/66
- The Rolling Stones released 19th Nervous Breakdown as their new single in
England. (It won’t come out until
February 12th here in The States.)
It
will eventually go to #1 in the UK and #2 the US.
Also
on 2/4, Bob Dylan and The Band played at the Convention Centre in Louisville,
Kentucky. This was the first date of their new world tour, which would be the first
using all electric instruments, after Dylan had ‘gone electric’ at the 1965
Newport Folk Festival the year before.
Also
on 2/4, The Nashville Tennessean reports that Johnny Cash will file a
$25-million defamation of character lawsuit against the Ku Klux Klan, which has
circulated messages demanding boycotts of his concerts, falsely believing he
married an African-American woman.
(Wait .. say WHAT??!?!?!) Cash's wife was country legend June Carter ... who was white!
OOPS!!!
Major correction below ... thanks, Harvey! (kk)
kk:
That lawsuit was about JR's
first wife Vivian Liberto, NOT June Cash.
Vivian Distin (née Liberto, formerly Cash;
April 23, 1934 – May 24, 2005) was an American homemaker and author. She is
notable as the first wife of singer Johnny Cash and mother of their four daughters. She
inspired his first hit single "I Walk the Line".[1]
Born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, she grew up in a Sicilian-American
household and was raised Catholic. She married Cash in San Antonio, but they
separated after several years. In 1965, Cash, who was already well known, was
arrested for drug possession. She stood by him during this time, and
photographs of her were widely publicized.
Between 1965 and 1966, she faced discrimination due to her racial identity after white supremacists classified her as Black based on
her appearance in the photos. At the time, interracial marriage was illegal in
many places, and white supremacists claimed her marriage to Cash was unlawful.
As a result, both she and her husband experienced harassment, and he was
boycotted in the South for a year until his manager provided documentation
confirming her classification as White.
Harvey Kubernik
