If you were to ask him if he saw himself as a great man, he would simply say “No.” He saw himself as a man who had loved and lost and made mistakes along the way, as we all have. I doubt if he even saw the gift he truly possessed, that uncanny ability to express the feelings of so many people and put them to word and music. (Calin Coburn)

Many sources indicate that Bob dropped out of sight completely when he retired from the Sons of the Pioneers. That was not quite how it was. He recorded with them and appeared as a guest at rodeos and on their shows at various times, including The Lucky U Ranch Show, an offshoot of the Rex Allen Radio Show but sponsored by Planters Peanuts instead of Phillips Petroleum. When Bob retired, Tommy Doss took his place.

On January 14, 1953, Roy Rogers was the subject of Ralph Edwards' television program, This is Your Life. The original Sons of the Pioneers (Tim, Lloyd, Pat and the Farr Brothers) appeared on the show to surprise him and sing Tumbling Tumbleweeds with him. Bob was conspicuous by his absence because he and P-Nuts had taken that long-awaited cruise to Hawaii. Intending to remain for only a few weeks, they found those people so friendly and hospitable that they stayed for two months. One after another, people they met would ask them to spend a few days with them. From this visit came Bob's South Seas love songs.

            As soon as I retired, we started planning the trip. I’d always wanted to go to Hawaii and I don’t like to fly so we took the boat. It started out to be just a two-week vacation. You have to remember I’d just retired and my name and my face was still pretty prominent with the general public. Well, on this boat so many people recognized me who were Island residents that, by the time we got into port, I had several invitations to come and stay a few days at different people’s homes. I didn’t want to offend anyone by turning them down so I accepted everybody’s invitation.
            By the time we headed home, those two weeks had stretched into a couple of months.   We had a wonderful time and I made it a point to not over-stay our welcome at any one place. We’d stay at one house and visit for three or four days and then move on to the next until I’d satisfied all the invitations.
            One home we stayed at even had a nice little guest house out beside a pool and I’d spend hours relaxing by that pool. It was also during this trip that I was inspired to write those Hawaiian songs.

        They had a local radio station on the other side of the lake where the main town of Pine Knot was located. [Bob] said he was listening to the news one day and he thought he heard mention that a relative of his had died or something in the Los Angeles area. Wondering if he’d heard correctly, he decided to drive over to the radio station and try and get a little more information. When he walked in, identified himself, and told them why he was there, the station manager exclaimed, “You’re who? Bob Nolan!” Bob said, “Yes, but forget about that. I’m here to find out if I heard the news correctly, if this concerned a relative of mine.” Obviously the man was more interested in the fact he’d just found out Bob Nolan of the Sons of the Pioneers was living there at Big Bear Lake than in helping Bob with any information. Bob finally left in disgust without finding out a thing.  However, to his relief, he did later establish it wasn’t a relative of his.

This is part of that "little talk" to the Women's Club:

…as I was saying, maggots don’t know what they are doing, but we do. That makes us a thousand times worse than maggots. When we finally succeed---oh, you don’t think we could end up eating each other?

Think about it in your darker moments and, while you’re at it, you might want to add these statistics. You see, it took the human race five thousand years to reach one billion; it took more than a hundred years to reach two billion. We went to three billion in less than fifty years; to four billion in less than fifteen years in 1974. It’s my guess that we’ll reach five billion in little more than ten years. And time gets shorter and shorter and the maggots keep multiplying.

Think about this, too—before we reach five billion, another one hundred thousand square miles of precious land will be concreted over and God never created a potato, a tomato or a carrot that can grow out of cement. And then there is the human excretion and waste that we insist on pumping into our oceans, the plastics that so devastate our friends of the sea. And in so short a time this waste will spread another hundred miles out to sea, and where have all the fish gone? Are there statistics on that? And are “they” ever trying to keep it quiet!

And there is that damnable word “they” again. And your insistent question, “Who are ‘they’?” And my insipid answer—“I don’t know.” But they are there, nevertheless. They have been around for a long time. They decide what we shall know and what we shall not know; what we shall hear and see; and what we shall not hear and see.

They even concocted the religions we live by. There are a lot of them, too, and each thinks his is the only one. So it only follows they would create the gods we worship, and there are a lot of them, too. And each thinks his is the only one.

Now, all of this would seem to indicate there is no God; quite the opposite is true. There most definitely is a necessary God, without which there would be nothing, a concept so vast that it usually scares the bejeebers out of anyone who dares to face it.

But there, we’re getting too close to a topic that should be dealt with by the experts. And when I speak of experts, I’m not talking about your Billy Grahams nor your Oral Roberts nor any of the other charlatans around us. I’m speaking of the scientists and the philosophers who know the answers and who long ago have given up on us because they know that we don’t want to hear the truth. We’re satisfied with our long-held childish superstitions and fairy tales.

But enough. I wonder how many of us have ever stopped to think about what our children’s children will be into, say sixty or seventy years from now, or even sooner. Eat each other? It’s a definite possibility. But don’t worry about it. It will go away or, more correctly, I should say, we’ll go away. That’s right, we’ll be the lucky ones. We won’t be here to see it—and that’s good. We won’t hear it when they deride us for all the time we wasted when we said, “Let Charlie do it.” And all the time, Charlie was passing the buck to someone else, and that someone else?                   

Oh, good heaven, you know our method of operating as well as I do. If there is one wrong way to do a thing, we’ll climb over a dozen rights to get to it. When we finally succeed in exterminating ourselves from the face of this earth, then maybe, just maybe, somewhere someone or something will come up from the bowels of the sleeping past and put it all back together again.

Oh, Lord, will there ever again be a time to talk with the creatures who talk with God, and to swim in a moonlit lake among the stars?

One bright spot in Bob's retirement years was the birth of his only grandchild in the Spring of 1953.  His daughter, Bobbie, gave birth to a beautiful baby boy she planned to name Colin Coburn.  Just as he wanted his music to be different from everyone else's, Bob wanted his grandson to be different, too, and he suggested she change the spelling but not the pronunciation of the name. "Just to make a difference," he told her.  Bobbie spelled the name of her son C-a-l-i-n. His father, Ken, was a handsome and personable young man from a large family in Arkansas.

The Cold War and the atom bomb testing in nearby Nevada were constantly on Bob's mind and, concerned about little Calin's future, he wrote a song he called That Cloud.

Not so very long ago a small young child I used to know would rise each dawn

And run to meet the morning sun before the sun had quite begun to warm the earth

And there behold the wondrous things of joy and life and flying wings as they were born

Until that cloud of rancid grey came rollin’ in to stay, and stay! to blind the sun!

And on my hill a blossom rare reached up for life that wasn’t there

And cried for we, the sun and me.

And so, I hold it as it dies and lock it in my mem’ries eyes

For it may be the last I’ll ever see.

And when the children run to play on some far distant lonely day,

They’ll go, and never know that they can never be.

Bob and P-Nuts

In 1955, according to his daughter, Bob tried out for a series of his own, a Warner Brothers television program called Cheyenne. The hero, Cheyenne Bodie, was a big, powerful loner, righting wrongs in the old West. The non-musical role may have appealed to Bob and it seems he considered returning to the movies. (When he was with the Sons of the Pioneers, it was not acting he disliked, but the touring that was so necessary.) However, he did not get the part which was filled by Clint Walker, shown here beside a young Bob who may well have been chosen had he been still that age.

Bob Nolan (left) and Clint Walker.

Contrary to popular belief, Bob was not a hermit or a recluse. Although his desire for privacy was unusual in the entertainment field, it was quite natural for the average citizen.  Bob did have his friends and they were good friends. However, his cabin was off-limits to everyone but his wife. It was his refuge and his escape to the solitude he needed in which to write and replenish his soul. The small amount of royalty payments he received from his songs allowed Bob and P-Nuts a modest lifestyle and they lived simply. (To read more details about his later life, read Dick Goodman's memories in the Recollections section.)

Bob with Lloyd Perryman

(Courtesy of Wayne Perryman)

        My mother's father had a little cabin in Pioneertown and when I was a kid we would go up there sometimes.  Lloyd and Bob would hang out together some times when Bob and Peanuts would come up to visit.  Clearly, Bob and my dad were pals. (Wayne Perryman)
 

Bob continued to write songs for the rest of his life. He would write the words first and go over and over them until he was satisfied with them. (Compare his lyrics to the lyrics of popular songs and it is obvious that Bob's stand alone as poetry. Polished poetry. Next he would work out the melody. Occasionally, the melody would come first but usually it was the words, he said.  He might write the words out in longhand and print in the chord names.

None of the Sons of the Pioneers but Ken Carson could read or write music in the beginning but over the years they did learn the rudiments. By this time, Bob had learned a little about writing music himself and could make a simple lead sheet.

For at least twenty years he would call the Bob Ross Music Service in Hollywood and they would send over someone to put the music to paper as Bob sang and played his little Martin guitar. This worked in theory but was not perfect because, inevitably, mistakes were made. When Bob later heard his songs played, he could pinpoint an error immediately. When Laurence Zwisohn brought Bob's original Sunset version of Tumbling Tumbleweeds to him, Bob spotted an error in the first few bars so, by this time, Bob could evidently read music to a certain extent.

                The rough lead sheet was taken back to Bob Ross Music Service and tidied up a little.

If a print agreement had been signed, it would go to the publisher and be printed into sheet music which would be sold in book stores, music stores, etc. Bob's daughter said that he continued to have someone come in to transcribe for him until the end of his life. Ken Carson liked to tell of the time Bob called him over to transcribe Half Way 'Round the World for him in the middle of one night. Someone took the lyrics down in shorthand for him. Perhaps it was Ken.

Lloyd Perryman, Tommy Doss and Dale Warren, the current trio in the 1966 Sons of the Pioneers, put together a beautiful long play album of what they considered the best of Bob's songs plus some that had seldom, if ever,  been heard: A Sandman Lullaby, A Summer Night's Rain, You are My Eyes, Half Way 'Round the World and more. It is a real tribute to Bob, backed in stereo by the rich instrumentation of Lanham, Botkin, Jolly, Pohlman, Coleman and Frost.

This 1966 album of Bob's songs was also produced in stereo.

One week in 1975, on his way home to Las Vegas from Santa Barbara, Calin spent a few days with Bob and P-Nuts in their Studio City home. He took pictures of his grandfather and sent him prints. Those few prints are all that remain because Calin's entire early photographic work, including the negatives, was destroyed by a flash flood in 1987. But during that 1975 visit, Calin and Bob met as adults and a bond was forged. Calin will never share those conversations he had with his grandfather; they are too precious. "When Bob talked to me it was to me. For me. Nobody else. I can't say I got to know him - nobody knew him - but if he'd lived longer...."

Calin Coburn, photographer

The John Edwards Memorial Foundation (JEMF) is an archive and research center located originally in the Folklore and Mythology Center of the University of California at Los Angeles. It was chartered as an educational non-profit corporation, supported by gifts and contributions. The purpose of the JEMF was to further the serious study and public recognition of those forms of American folk music disseminated by commercial media such as print, sound recordings, films, radio, and television. These forms include the music referred to as cowboy, western, country & western, old time, hillbilly, bluegrass, mountain, country, Cajun, sacred, gospel, race, blues, rhythm and blues, soul, and folk rock. It was later moved to the University of North Carolina, into The Southern Folklife Collection. The Friends of the JEMF was organized as a voluntary non-profit association to enable persons to support the Foundation's work.  Ken Griffis was an officer and a major contributor.

The first edition of Hear My Song by Ken Griffis, 1974.

Bob continued to write songs and poetry. In 1974 he told Ken Griffis that, waking at 5:00 in the morning, he'd prop himself up in bed and write for two or three hours. He might be working on several tunes at once and none of them were cowboy songs. When the songs were finished, he said, he filed them away "to await the time when conditions are right for them to be released." He sang only for his own enjoyment.

The next three pictures from Bob's photo album are described by Jimmy's daughter, Lindalee Wakely:

The party was to celebrate Mom and Dad's 40^th wedding anniversary. It was held on their anniversary date, December 13 1975 at our home in Toluca Lake, California. I had planned this party for three years and my two sisters, Deanna and Carol, worked with me to make it a reality. It was a complete surprise.

Wayne Burson trained his own racehorses in Washington State and was racing one in San Francisco the weekend of the party but made it to the party, anyway. Ted French was in hundreds of westerns. He was a lovely man and we grew up with Ted and his family. One of his sons was Victor French whom we knew from childhood as "Eddie". Victor played "Mr. Edwards" on "Little House on the Prairie and he came to the party with Ted. It really was like Old Home Week. Oliver Drake was a screenwriter. He wrote 26 Men for TV and literally hundreds of westerns. He also was a director and directed most of Daddy's movies.

I love that photograph. To me, it represents the entire western movie. The star, the stunt double, the "bad" guy, the director, the sidekick and the very gifted writer of the most wonderful western songs in the world, Bob Nolan.

Wesley Tuttle who was also there with his wife, Marilyn, recalls, "Johnny Bond,  Jimmy Wakely and myself sang Tumbling Tumbleweeds to the mike up on the camera."

On April 28 1976, Ken Griffis sat in on an interview by Betty Cox Larimer, the publisher of Music City News and Lee Rector, the editor. The interview took place in Bob Nolan's home in Studio City. Bob’s mynah bird was there, too, constantly interrupting the interview with comments like, “Hello, P-Nuts”, “Good Morning”, and “I like gambling!” (When the mynah spoke, everyone but Bob stopped speaking.) As a result of this interview, an article was published in the Music City News, August, 1976, page 18.

During the interview, Bob got out his old guitar and sang one of his new songs, In This Room, for them. This song exemplified the type of music he was currently writing. Although the song was never recorded commercially by anyone, it is powerfully evocative and as relevant today as it was the day he wrote it.

In This Room

This small hotel overlooking the sea

Now crumbling, condemned and alone;

I come not to watch it die but to walk inside of

And talk with, and listen to, just one very special room ~

This room.

This empty, bare, forlorn and alone room.

Where the sun calls each day but there’s no one at home room

Well, the years have been dragging their weary feet along

Every wall down, at last, to end

In the sunbleached path on the floor

From the broken window across the room and out the open door.

But I still can feel the warmth and glow

Where all the love this room could hold

Now falls into dust with the long ago

And so I listen.

But all I can hear is the muted sound of a lonely heartbeat crying

Somewhere in the shadows where you left it

In this room.

And the memories come tumbling through my mind

Like the fallen leaves in the autumn wind

And I open my arms to welcome them as they gather here

In this room.

In this room.

And I’m trying to remember how long it has been

And where did it start and how did it end.

I can’t seem to recall a tear or even an angry word

Or a broken vow, for none were made.

Or did someone just forget to come home to

This room?

This now is the start and the end of forever room,

Where tomorrow may come and again it may never room.

So, I walk to the window, look out to the sea

And the sea is the same as it used to be ~

So blue! So very blue!

And I let this tired body of mine fill the very space that once was you

And I feel you breathe inside of me,

And my mind is a tangle of hopeless dreams

And this longing within me has nowhere to go.

And so I listen.

But all I can hear is the muted sound of a lonely heartbeat crying

Somewhere in the shadows where you left it ~

In this room.

And the memories come tumbling through my mind

Like the fallen leaves in the autumn wind

And I open my arms to welcome them as they gather here

In this room, in this room.

On September 24, 1976, the Sons of the Pioneers saw their star placed in the Walk of Fame 6845 Hollywood Boulevard  between Sycamore and Le Brea. The dedication was live on KLAC and the day was very hot. The following photographs were taken at that time.

Bob with Roy Rogers

The photo was taken the day the Pioneers got their star on Hollywood Boulevard. In addition to the then current lineup headed by Lloyd, Roy and Bob were there along with a gaunt looking Hugh Farr. Roy was being interviewed when he saw Bob arrive and he quickly (but politely) ended the interview and went over to Bob. From the smiles on their faces you can see how glad they were to see each other. (Laurence Zwisohn)

6845 Hollywood Blvd

                        Replica of the Sons of the Pioneers' Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame from the Internet.

On May 31, 1977, Bob lost his closest friend. Lloyd Perryman died after complications following heart surgery. Bob was so upset that, instead of going to the funeral, he stayed home and wrote a poem he later gave to Buddie and Wayne -

Leaves are fallin'

Wild geese are callin'

The skies are red each dawn.

The autumn breeze the waters tease

So they've put their white caps on.

All nature's asleep 'neath a blanket snowflakes bring

Till softly kissed upon the cheek by the warm gentle breath of Spring.

Now, should I follow the geese and the swallow

Or through the long nite yearn

And stay with the leaves from the barren trees

And wait for your return?

Johnny Bond, Ken Griffis, Bob Nolan and Eddie Brandt.

(Calin Coburn Collections)

On October 21, 1977, Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers were honored  by the Old West Trail Foundation at Rapid City, South Dakota. Bob "couldn't get away" to accept the award so long-time friend and associate of the Pioneers, Pete Logan, was chosen to do the job. At the same ceremony, Bob was chosen for the William F. Cody Award for Music. In his acceptance speech on Bob's behalf, Pete Logan said, "Bob Nolan had, and still has, a way of putting words together unlike anybody I have ever heard. Had he never put a note of music to his songs, the poetry alone would have guaranteed him a place in history. I remember in the mid-50s that Bob Nolan and his publisher sat down and counted some twelve hundred songs that he has written, knowing full well that there were a few hundred others. And Nolan is still writing, even today. He doesn't try to publish them, just writes them and says, 'Someday the world will be ready for them.'"

October 29, 1978. Casey Tibbs and Bob Nolan, photo by William G Bowen

(Calin Coburn Collections)

1978 brought a change of lifestyle for Bob - more socializing than he'd done since he retired. Excerpt from a letter to Bill Bowen from Casey Tibbs dates this photo -

I appreciate you sending me the 8 x 10 of Bob Nolan and me taken at the KLAC Ranch Party part at the Montie Montana Rodeo Ranch. Nolan was always a hero of mine as were all the Pioneers.

Casey Tibbs, twice the World Champion All-Around Cowboy and six times the World Saddle Bronc Champ was a good friend and buddy of Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers for years.  The Pioneers entertained at the same rodeos right from the beginning of Casey's career. When Casey married Sandra Clark in 1979, the Pioneers provided the music and Tumbling Tumbleweeds was one of the songs that preceded the nuptials. There were 500 guests at the ceremony and, if not actually present, Bob and P-Nuts Nolan would have been invited.

Snuff Garrett, Bob Nolan and Olaf Wieghorst, 1979

This photo was taken in Snuff Garrett's home at a party he gave for Olaf Wieghorst who had not seen Bob since Bob bought sketches from him during the rodeo at Madison Square Garden in the early 1940s. Bob had not realized the value of those sketches. He is holding an etching Olaf gave Snuff. Today Olaf Wieghorst's world famous western paintings are exhibited at the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City, the Olaf Wieghorst Museum in El Cajon, CA, etc. His "Navajo Madonna" is possibly his best known work.

Bob Nolan and Jim Nabors who is holding Dawn Garrett, Snuff's daughter.

"This photo was taken at my home in Bel-Air, CA (345 St. Pierre Rd.) at a party I gave for Brenda Lee." (Snuff Garrett)
 

Inside the motorhome: Bob, Doc Denning, Dick Goodman and Robert Wagoner.

Doc Denning noted, "He was quiet, modest, polite and unassuming. I really don’t think Bob knew how much he was loved by so many for his work and personality.  The Reinsmen and I spent a couple of weekends with him at Bob Wagoner’s and, in addition to singing with him, we went on a couple of fishing trips into the Sierras and sat around visiting. P-Nuts Nolan said that was the first time Bob had really been out with a bunch of guys in years. We went out there and left him alone. If he wanted to talk, we talked; if he didn't, we just stared at the mountains. We respected his privacy. That was back in 1978. We went again the following year and planned a third trip for the next year but Bob had died early that year."

A larger fish.

Horseshoes.

In Robert Wagoner's recording studio. Bob, Doc and Robert.

Bob Nolan and Robert Wagoner in the recording studio. Sound clip courtesy of Michelle Sundin.

Doc Denning, Bob and Jerry Compton

Bob's younger half-brother, Mike, would take him fishing along the coast of California and Mexico. Not much is known about Michael Nolan but he was often with Bob and P-Nuts and was a good friend of his niece, Bobbie.

Michael Foster Nolan, Bob's half brother.

Mike Nolan, Bob's half brother

Producer Tommy "Snuff" Garrett, of 50 Guitars fame, always loved the old western movies and songs. He and Rex Allen together wrote Rex's autobiography, he knew Gene Autry and he was a close friend of Roy Rogers – but he still didn't know Bob Nolan. One day he took the bull by the horns, got Bob's address from Nudie, the Hollywood tailor famous for the Singing Cowboys' extravagantly spectacular costumes, and drove over to the Nolan's home in Studio City. He knocked on the door and introduced himself. Bob asked him in and they sat down and watched TV until Snuff decided he'd go. Nothing else was said. Snuff patiently continued his visits and TV-watching with Bob until one day Bob turned to him and said, "You want to record, don't you?" Snuff replied yes, that's what he wanted. See Snuff Garrett's Recollections for the full story of Bob's last recording. This is how Bob remembers it:

A very dear friend of mine asked me to do it and I turned him down at first but he kept at me with good labels and everything. And I finally gave in about six months later and we made a record. I’ve known Snuff for so damn long. When he came to me with it, I didn’t like the idea at the beginning because I had been out of the business for over twenty years but Snuff, he wouldn’t quit, dammit! And it was one of my stipulations that this would be the last one. I mean, I’m not going to follow up on it at all.

First he brought the people with United Artists out here and they liked what they heard and said, “Hell, yes. We’ll do it.” But before they got the record out, why, United Artists was sold and I don’t know who the hell bought it though I know what the price was. Eight million dollars! So, finally, about six months later or maybe a little more, Snuff got Elektra – that’s a Warner Brothers affiliate, I hear – to accept it and so far it’s been doing all right when you consider I’ve been out of the doggone business as long as I have. It’s still on the charts and been on for over ten weeks. I want it to go because Snuff has sunk so damn many dollars in it.  The money was just flowing like mad. He got me everything I wanted. I wanted certain voices behind it since I couldn’t get the Pioneers. That was absolutely out of the category because they were under contract to another label. I would have loved to have the Sons.

They’ve given me quite a broad choice of stuff to record by myself, see. They let me choose it. I didn’t like the fact that they specifically ordered Tumbling Tumbleweeds and Cool Water which have been sung so much by the Sons and myself. I didn’t want to do them over again, but they convinced me that that’s what the people would expect, you know, so I did them. I loved the background music and the whole thing was very palatable to me. I was a little reticent to choose too many new ones but he said, “Now give me some of your new stuff,” and I give him three and he wanted more. I said, “No.” I said, “The record won’t be versatile enough to please the people, see?” I said, “Let’s get some other writers in there and have a conglomerative deviation of songs.

Page 42 from the British Country Music People magazine of Dec. 1979 written by Tony Byworth, editor at that time.

I have a favorite spot of mine out in the Mojave Desert. I started going out there years ago when I still had my Jeep. I’d put an inflatable kiddie pool, a 50-gal drum of water, and a beach umbrella in the back and I’d drive out past Barstow and then I’d cut off on to this dirt road and go ‘way out several miles into the desert by myself. When I reached this spot I’d set this kiddie pool up, fill it with water, set up my beach umbrella and then I’d wander off into the desert for a few hours. Later that afternoon, I’d come back to that spot, and by then the water in the kiddie pool would be nice and warm, so I’d take off my clothes and settle down in that pool, lie back, and just relax. And that’s about as close to God as you could get. There was just nobody out there but me and Him. (see Dick Goodman's recollections)

In 1979, responding to the public's renewed interest in Bob Nolan, he allowed Judy Finch to photograph him at his Big Bear cabin. There is no record of an interview.

                 Photos by Judy Finch, 1979

On February 21, 1979, Ray Whitley died suddenly on a fishing trip to Mexico. He was 77. On the evening of February 28, Bob Nolan joined many of Ray's old friends and associates at the Sportsmen's Lodge in Studio City, California, to honor his memory. The group joined in singing several Ray Whitley and Bob Nolan songs. Wesley and Marilyn Tuttle visited with Bob that evening and Marilyn asked him if he was still writing. He said he was and that he was still putting the songs "into my garage". Wesley remarked that he was such a quiet man that he didn't volunteer anything, just sat and listened as he had always done. "You had to drag any conversation out of him." Wesley had known Bob since 1937 when they both worked in the Starrett films (although not together) and Marilyn sang backup with Bob on some of his later singles. Wesley said Bob was so "within himself" that he would never reminisce or bring up any subject unless it was about something he was really enjoying at the time. John Wright, referring to that evening:

On February 28th, a week after his death, about forty friends gathered for a very private dinner, where each told either of what Ray had meant to him or her, or otherwise recalled some story concerning Ray. At the dinner were people like Bob Nolan who, when rising to pay his tribute was quite incapable of concealing either his great sense of loss, or his tears. Jimmy Wakely was there, Stuart Hamblen, Tex Williams. Ray's dearest friend, Eddie Dean, Wesley Tuttle, Hank Penny, Doye O'Dell, and others. The men stood and sang "Back in The Saddle Again", along with other Western classics such as "Tumblin' Tumbleweeds", and later Stuart Hamblen sang "It Is No Secret". Jimmy and Eddie lent their voices to a few spirituals ... and Bob Nolan, he wept.