Merle Ronald Haggard (1937-2016) | WikiTree FREE Family Tree
Merle Haggard
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Merle Ronald Haggard (1937 - 2016)

Merle Ronald Haggard
Born in Oildale, Kern, California, United Statesmap
Ancestors ancestors
Son of and
Brother of
Husband of — married 1956 (to 1964) [location unknown]
Husband of — married 28 Jan 1968 (to 1978) in Minden, Douglas, Nevada, USAmap
Husband of — married 1 Jun 1985 in Shasta County, California, USAmap
[children unknown]
Died at age 79 in Palo Cedro, Shasta, California, United Statesmap
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Profile last modified | Created 18 Nov 2015
This page has been accessed 4,650 times.

Biography

Notables Project
Merle Haggard is Notable.
  • Merle Haggard is one of the pioneers of "the Bakersfield sound" in country music. And one of the genre's leading singers, songwriters and instrumentalists.
  • Father: James Francis Haggard; mother: Flossie Mae Harp
  • A child of the Great Depression, Merle's family came to the Bakersfield area in California after their barn burned down at Checotah, OK. He was born shortly thereafter in an old boxcar serving as the family's makeshift shelter.
  • Merle Haggard has been married five times, with five children from two of those marriages.
  • Married Bonnie (Campbell) Owens, 28 Jan 1968 @ Minden, Douglas, Nevada, div. 27 Nov 1978 @ Kern County, California (or Nov 1976?) Owens had previously been married to another Bakersfield musician, Buck Owens
  • Married Leona Bell Williams, 7 Oct 1978 @ Minden, Douglas, Nevada, div. 3 Dec 1984 @ Shasta County, California
  • Married Deborah J. Parret, 1 Jun 1985 @ Shasta County, California
  • Married Theresa Ann Lane, 8 Dec 1994 @ Clark County, Nevada
  • As a young man, Haggard spent some time in prison, due to a botched robbery. This followed a series of lesser criminal issues, including in juvenile detention complete with escapes. He was eventually sent to San Quentin.
  • Two of Haggard's prison associates ended up on death row, motivating him to turn his life around. He worked a variety of jobs, eventually finding his way to music. His songwriting reflects his life experience.
  • Years later in 1972, California Governor Ronald Reagan cleared his record with a full pardon.
  • Haggard points to Ferlin Husky as an influence on his singing
  • Song sample: Branded Man
  • Song sample: Sing Me Back Home
  • Song sample: Mama Tried
  • Song sample: White Line Fever
  • Song sample: If We Make it Through December
  • Song sample: The Bottle Let Me Down
  • Inducted to the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1977
  • Songwriters Hall of Fame
  • Ranked #33 in Rolling Stone's list of Top 100 Songwriters of All Time, and #77 on their list of Top 100 Singers of All Time
  • Inducted to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1994
  • Three Academy of Country Music special awards: Poet Award, Cliffie Stone Pioneer Award and Crystal Milestone Award.
  • Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, 2006
  • In a 2015 analysis based on number of weeks on the charts, Billboard Magazine rated Haggard as the top country act of the modern era.
  • Merle Haggard has earned numerous other awards and honors, including at the Kennedy Center in 2010.

Sources

From behind the ancestry.com subscription wall:

Acknowledgements

Haggard-477 was created by Sheila Wohlrabe through the import of Remling_Reams.ged.





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DNA Connections
It may be possible to confirm family relationships with Merle by comparing test results with other carriers of his ancestors' Y-chromosome or mitochondrial DNA. Y-chromosome DNA test-takers in his direct paternal line on WikiTree: It is likely that these autosomal DNA test-takers will share some percentage of DNA with Merle:

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[Living Winter]
OK, now we can start with the other duplicate relations. In the merge, you chose the higher numbered parental profiles, thereby cutting them off from lots of other relations. We've got some more work to do before this duplication is corrected.
posted by [Living Winter]
[Living Winter]
Haggard-477 and Haggard-450 appear to represent the same person because: Whoops! Haggard-477 was created a few days after Haggard-450, so they need to be merged into one, and for database efficiency, the merge goes into the profile with the lowest number. Unless there's two Merle Ronald Haggards, both born in the 1930s, this is a duplicate profile. Also, FYI: You are pretty new here, so you might not know that for famous people, the red privacy setting, which excludes everyone else from seeing the profile's information, is not appropriate. Heck, you may not even know about editing privacy settings, or even that this profile got that red setting. (It's the default for the still-living.) Generally, privacy is open enough to be seen (one of those yellow or orange settings) for anyone who has a wiki page, who are known as "Notables" in WikiTree jargon. (Sorry if I'm telling you something you already knew.)
posted by [Living Winter]

Featured National Park champion connections: Merle is 16 degrees from Theodore Roosevelt, 22 degrees from Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kruger, 17 degrees from George Catlin, 14 degrees from Marjory Douglas, 19 degrees from Sueko Embrey, 18 degrees from George Grinnell, 27 degrees from Anton Kröller, 18 degrees from Stephen Mather, 24 degrees from Kara McKean, 16 degrees from John Muir, 19 degrees from Victoria Hanover and 22 degrees from Charles Young on our single family tree. Login to find your connection.

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Categories: This Day In History April 06 | Country Music Hall of Fame | San Quentin State Prison, San Quentin, California | California, Notables | Notables