Jimmy Dean, a renowned musician, actor, and entrepreneur, played a pivotal role in popularizing country music, a genre that was initially overlooked by mainstream media in the 1960s. He achieved widespread fame with his hit song "Big Bad John," which reached number one in the US and England, and continued to enjoy enduring popularity due to his long-standing affiliation with "Jimmy Dean Pure Pork Sausage," a company he founded and later sold to Consolidated Foods in 1984.
Jimmy Dean, a distant cousin of the iconic actor James Dean, was born Jimmy Ray Dean on August 10, 1928, in Plainview, Texas. After serving in the U.S. Air Force during the late 1940s, he pursued a career as a professional singer, touring with his band, The Texas Wildcats, which featured renowned guitarist Roy Clark. In 1953, he scored his first hit with the song "Bummin' Around."
Dean's television career began in the Washington D.C. market, where he hosted the program "Town and Country Time." He was a promoter of rising country acts, and notable country singers such as Clark and Patsy Cline got their start with Dean. He eventually fired Clark but later helped promote his career. Dean subsequently moved to New York after signing with Columbia Records, where he hosted a TV variety show for the CBS network.
In 1961, his song "Big Bad John" reached number one on the Billboard charts and won him the 1962 Grammy Award for Best Country & Western Recording. Several of his subsequent songs charted in the Top 40, and he scored a Top 10 hit in 1962 with the song "PT 109," commemorating President John F. Kennedy's patrol torpedo boat. Due to his affability and burgeoning popularity, he occasionally guest-hosted "The Tonight Show." ABC offered him a variety show in the mid-1960s, which he used as a platform to present country music on his terms, as a mainstream entertainment.
His show introduced the first major TV exposure to a number of country singers, including George Jones, Charlie Rich, and Buck Owens. It also featured the first Muppet, Jim Henson's Rowlf the Dog.
