More Information:

About Aubrey Allen Walker:

1920: Whitney, Hill, Texas
Aubrey A Walker 24 , Tx, Cotton Buyer
Oree Walker 22
Aubrey Walker 4 6/12
Lucile E Walker 2 7/12

1930: Lubbock, Lubbock, Texas
Aubrey A Walke 35
Oree E Walke 31
Aubrey Walke 14
Lucille Walke 12

About Cindy aka Lucile E Walker:

HALL OF FAME
Cindy Walker

"I write...for people, for the artist and (they) all have different personalities. I just write what I think will suit them..sort of a tailor-made song. Some ideas come out of the blue, but not usually. I guess the more you write, the more you're likely to come up with ideas. It's just labor, that's all there is to it....The title tells the story. If you can get a real good title, you've got something. I always write from the title. I've never written a song without the title...The words and music come together. It just sort of comes to you. The songs just sing themselves to me. They kind of write themselves. I just stand back and listen..." "(Best tunes) are songs with a face. You recognize them. You know them. It's like a person. They have a face that's outstanding. Other songs don't have a face; you just hear them, that's all. The really good ones are few and far between."

Birth Name: Cindy Walker
Induction Year: 1970

Date of Birth: 7/20/1918
Place of Birth: Mart, Tx

Date of Death: 3/23/2006
Place of Death: Mexia, Tx

Career Milestones:
age 7--first entertainment work singing and dancing in "The Toy Land Review"
age 16--while working at Billy Rose's Casa Manana in Fort Worth, Walker wrote "Casa de Manana"; became the club's theme song
1940--traveled over the summer with her parents to Los Angeles and stopped at the Crosby Building in Hollywood where Larry Crosby (Bing's brother) became interested in "Lone Star Trail" (he demoed it and played it for Bing and Lester Santly--Bing's music publisher); Bing recorded the song in December 1940
1941--"Lone Star Trail" (recorded by Bing Crosby) released by Decca in February; went to #23 on the Pop charts
1941--signed a five year recording contract with Decca based on the strength of her singing on "Lone Star Trail" demo
1941--Bob Wills recorded four of Walker's songs on July 24
1942-1944--wrote all 39 songs used by Bob Wills in the eight western movies he shot for Columbia during this period
1944--first top ten country hit, "You're From Texas" recorded by Bob Wills
1944--first top ten country hit as Decca artist, "When My Blue Moon Turns to Gold Again"
1947--decided to write full time after recording contract with Decca ended mid 1960s--recorded an album for Monument Records of her biggest hits, "Words & Music by Cindy Walker"
1970-- Induction into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame
1997-- Induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame

Awards:
1944--BMI Country Award\You're From Texas
1945--BMI Country Award\Triflin' Gal
1950--BMI Country Award\Take Me in Your Arms and Hold Me
1952--BMI Country Award\The Gold Rush is Over
1954--BMI Country Award\Thank You For Calling
1955--BMI Country Award\I Don't Care
1958--BMI Country Award\Anna Marie\Hey, Mr. Bluebird
1962--BMI Popular Award\Dream Baby\You Don't Know Me
1965--BMI Country Award\This Is It
1966--BMI Country Award\Distant Drums
1967--BMI Country Award\Distant Drums
1968--BMI Country Award\In the Misty Moonlight\You Don't Know Me
1968--BMI Popular Award\In the Misty Moonlight
1969--BMI Country Award\Heaven Says Hello
1971--BMI Country Award\Dream Baby
1971--BMI Popular Award\Dream Baby
1972--BMI Country Award\Dream Baby
1976--BMI Country Award\Cherokee Maiden
1981--BMI Popular Award\You Don't Know Me
1982--BMI Country Award\You Don't Know Me
1982--BMI Popular Award\I Don't Care
1983--BMI Country Award\I Don't Care
1984--BMI Country Award\Dream Baby
1997--Country Music Hall of Fame induction

Catalog Highlights

Anna Marie
Artists: Jim Reeves

Cherokee Maiden
Artists: Bob Wills, Merle Haggard, Mel Tillis

China Doll
Artists: The Ames Brothers

Distant Drums
Artists: Jim Reeves, Ed Ames, Jim Ed Brown, Roy Orbison, Tex Ritter, Charley Pride

Dream Baby (How Long Must I Dream)
Artists: Roy Orbison, Glen Campbell, Lacy J. Dalton, Waylon Jennings, Patti Page, Cher, Del Shannon, Jerry Lee Lewis, Perry Como, Al Hurt, Bob Regan & Lucille Starr (The Canadian Sweethearts)

Dusty Skies
Artists: Bob Wills, Spade Cooley, Johnny Bond, The Sons of the Pioneers

Heaven Says Hello
Artists: Sonny James

Hey, Mister Bluebird
Artists: Ernest Tubb & The Wilburn Brothers

I Don't Care
Co-writer: Webb Pierce
Artists: Webb Pierce, Faron Young, Ricky Skaggs

In the Misty Moonlight
Artists: Jerry Wallace, Dean Martin, Bill Anderson, George Morgan, Faron Young, Jim Reeves, Kitty Wells, Slim Whitman, Skeeter Davis, Eddy Arnold

Lone Star Trail
Artists: Bing Crosby, Vaughn Monroe, The Leo Reichman Orchestra

Miss Molly
Artists: Bob Wills, Smokey Rogers, Tex Williams, Leon McAuliffe, Asleep at the Wheel

Not That I Care
Artists: Jerry Wallace

Take Me In Your Arms (And Hold Me)
Artists: Eddy Arnold, Jim Reeves and Deborah Allen, Les Paul & Mary Ford

Thank You For Calling
Artists: Billy Walker, Jo Stafford, Hank Show

The Day You Left Me
Artists: Eddy Arnold

The Gold Rush Is Over
Artists: Hank Snow

This Is It
Artists: Jim Reeves, Mary Ford

Triflin' Gal
Artists: Al Dexter (1945), Walt Shrum and his Colorado Hillbillies (1945)

You Are My Treasure
Artists: Jack Greene

You Don't Know Me
Co-writer: Eddy Arnold
Artists: Eddy Arnold, Ray Charles, Elvis Presley, Charlie Rich, Emmylou Harris, Van Morrison, Ricky Nelson, Willie Nelson, Don Gibson, Jackie Wilson, Joe Simon, Ruth Brown, Carmen McRae, Patti Page, Faron Young, Jimmy Dean, Jim Nabors, Vic Damone, Floyd Cramer, Dottie West, Nancy Wilson, Henry Mancini, Eydie Gorme, Bobby Goldsboro, Jim Reeves, Mickey Gilley, Jerry Vale, Ramsey Lewis, Richard Manuel, Steve Marriott, Don McLean, Bette Midler, Roy Orbison, Anne Murray, Boots Randolph, Kenny Rogers, Kenny Loggins, David Sanborn, Roger Whittaker

You're From Texas
Artists: Bob Wills, Billy Mize, Charlie Walker, Roy Rogers

Warm, Red Wine
Artists: Bob Wills, Ernest Tubb, George Jones, Johnny Bush, Wes Buchanan
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Cindy Walker 3-26-06

Cindy Walker, award winning songwriter, died March 23 in Mexia. Ms. Walker was born in Mart and resided in Mexia for the last 52 years. Ms. Walker began her songwriting career in Hollywood in the early 40s when Bing Crosby recorded "Lone Star Trail." This began a long, illustrious career resulting in such hits as "You Don t Know Me," "Cherokee Maiden," "Misty Moonlight," "Take Me in Your Arms and Hold Me," and "Dream Baby."

Ms. Walker wrote more than 500 songs which were recorded by artists such as Roy Orbison, Bob Wills, Elvis Presley, Ray Charles, Willie Nelson and Ray Benson. Ms. Walker was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, Fort Worth Cowgirl Hall of Fame and the Texas Country Music Hall of Fame.

Ms. Walker was preceded in death by her mother Oree Eiland Walker, father Aubrey A. Walker, Sr., and her brother Aubrey A. Walker, Jr. She is survived by nieces Carol Adams, Jerry Lawrence and husband John Lawrence, and Molly Dusenberry. In addition, she is survived by three great nephews, Kenneth Mahoney and wife Betty Mahoney, Kevin Knebel and wife Fancy Mills Knebel, and Christopher Kyle and two great nieces, Elisa Knebel and husband Girindre Beeharry and Jennifer Dusenberry.

The family would like to thank her longtime companion and friend Willie Mae Addikson for her care and devotion. Funeral services will be at the First Presbyterian Church, Mexia at 10:30 a.m. Monday, March 27. The Rev. Ken Lane and the Rev. Jack White will officiate with interment following in the Mexia Cemetery. Pallbearers will be Dick Flatt, Alden Gar ber, Frank Parker, Bubba Garber, Clint Flatt and Glenn McGuire.. Honorary pallbearers are all of Her friends in the Music Industry.

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Cindy Walker From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cindy Walker, (July 20, 1918 - March 23, 2006) was an American singer/songwriter and dancer.

Born in Mart, Texas, Walker wrote a great many hit songs for a number of country music stars such as Bob Wills, Eddy Arnold, and Carl Smith. Walker wrote songs for Bing Crosby and the 1962 rock song "Dream Baby" for Roy Orbison. She also authored "Distant Drums" for Jim Reeves, a song that stayed at No.1 on the British charts for five weeks in 1966.

Other popular songs she wrote include "You Don't Know Me" co-written with Eddy Arnold and subsequently recorded by Ray Charles, Jerry Vale, Elvis Presley, and Mickey Gilley; and "In The Misty Moonlight" that was a big hit for both Jerry Wallace and Dean Martin, plus the Western song made popular by Gene Autry, "Blue Canadian Rockies".

The Los Angeles Times described her first sale:
In late 1940, the 22-year-old Walker accompanied her parents on a business trip to Los Angeles. They were driving down Sunset Boulevard, when she spotted the Crosby Building and asked her father to stop the car. "I had decided that if I ever got to Hollywood, I was going to try to show Bing Crosby a song I had written for him called 'Lone Star Trail,' " she recalled in a 1988 interview with the Chicago Tribune. "My father said, 'You're crazy, girl,' but he stopped the car."

Walker grabbed her song-filled briefcase and went inside. A few minutes later, she ran back to the car to get her mother to play the piano for her: Crosby's brother, Larry, had agreed to listen to the song. With her mother accompanying her, Walker sang "Lone Star Trail." Larry Crosby told her that Bing was looking for a Western song to record and might like it. The next day, she accompanied herself on the guitar and sang it for Bing at Paramount Studios, where he was making a movie. Bing Crosby, who called her "Sis," liked the song, and the unknown songwriter from Texas made her first sale.

She also wrote many hit songs for Bob Wills and they co-wrote "Sugar Moon" which, years after being a considerable success for him, was included by k.d. lang on her Shadowland album. All told, she wrote more than 500 recorded songs for an array of artists. In addition to her song writing, Walker also sang on stage and recorded a number of albums. Some of her best recording work was produced by Fred Foster at his Monument Records.

In 1970, she became a charter inductee to the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. In 1997 she was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and in 1998 into the Texas Country Music Hall of Fame. Her induction to the Nashville Country Music Hall of Fame in 1997 by singer Barbara Mandrell featured Walker accepting the award in an old evening gown. She then read a poem she'd written for the show: "In the 1980's my mother bought me a dress...for a BMI affair... and she said, "When they put you in The Hall Of Fame...that's the dress...I want you to wear"...and, I said, "Oh, mama...The Hall Of Fame...Why, that will never be"...and the years went by...but my mother's words...remained in my memory...and I know...tonight...she'd be happy...Tho she's gone now...to her rest...but I think of all...that she did for me...and, tonight... I'm wearing that dress!.." The speech was followed by a thunderous standing ovation and Walker left the stage after softly blowing a kiss in tears.

In 2006 American music icon Willie Nelson released an album's worth of Walker's songs. The album is You Don't Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker.

Walker died in her hometown on March 23, 2006 of natural causes.
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Fri. March 24.2006 12:54 PM ESTFamed Singer-Songwriter Cindy Walker Dies in Texas
Country Music Hall of Fame Member Wrote Classics for Eddy Arnold, Bob Wills and Others

Cindy Walker, one of the most prolific and successful songwriters in the history of country music, died Thursday (March 23) in her hometown of Mexia, Texas, following a lengthy illness. She was 87.

Inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1997, Walker has been the subject of national media attention following the March 14 release of Willie Nelson's critically-acclaimed tribute album, You Don't Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker.

Born July 20, 1918 in Mart, Texas, Walker had the unique ability to write hits in a wide variety of musical styles ranging from hard-core country to pop. With some 500 songs to her credit, the hits include Bob Wills' "Bubbles in My Beer," "Cherokee Maiden" and "You're From Texas," Ernest Tubb's "Hey Mr. Bluebird" and "Two Glasses Joe" and Roy Orbison's "Dream Baby (How Long Must I Dream)."

Walker was writing songs by the time she was 12. Traveling to Los Angeles with her family in 1941, she insisted her father stop the car when she saw a building that housed Bing Crosby's offices. An impromptu meeting with Crosby's brother led to the singer recording Walker's "Lone Star Trail." In Hollywood, Walker also landed a recording contract with Decca Records, began writing songs for singing cowboys and appeared in a series of short musical films known as "soundies, " a precursor to music videos.

It was also in Hollywood where Walker first met Bob Wills, who eventually recorded more than 50 of her songs, including more than 30 that were featured in his movies. Walker's tenure on the West Coast also led to several other hits, including Eddy Arnold's "Take Me in Your Arms and Hold Me" and Ernest Tubb's "Warm Red Wine."

In 1954, Walker and her mother moved back to Texas, and Walker began spending more time in Nashville. Although Arnold's 1956 recording of "You Don't Know Me" only reached No. 10 on the charts, their co-write is acknowledged as one of the greatest country classics of all time. Walker had additional success with Hank Snow's "The Gold Rush Is Over" and "The Next Voice You Hear" and George Morgan's "I Love Everything About You." Other Walker hits include Gene Autry's "Blue Canadian Rockies," Jim Reeves' "Distant Drums" and "Anna Marie," Sonny James' "Heaven Says Hello" and Jerry Wallace's "In the Misty Moonlight."

Indicating the timeless quality of Walker's songs, Ray Charles' version of "You Don't Know Me" was a highlight of Modern Sounds in Country & Western Music, his groundbreaking album from 1962. Mickey Gilley had a No. 1 hit with the song in 1981, and Ricky Skaggs topped the chart a year later with "I Don't Care," originally a 1955 hit for Webb Pierce. Her songs have been recorded by a long list of artists, including Merle Haggard, Glen Campbell and Michael Nesmith.

A charter member of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, Walker began to experience ill health following the death of her mother in 1991. Suffering from respiratory problems, she was transported from her home to a Mexia hospital around 8 p.m. Thursday and died shortly thereafter. Funeral services were pending Friday (March 24).

In the promotional materials for his tribute CD, Nelson noted, "Cindy has written songs consistently over the years that have become traditional standards. That sets her aside from your normal, everyday writer. She affected me and everyone else who came along after her. We had to have heard her music before we could do ours."
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Cindy Walker, prolific country songwriter, dies at 87
Texan wrote 500 songs, including 'You Don't Know Me' and 'Bubbles in My Beer'
By Michael Corcoran
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Friday, March 24, 2006

She had never stepped inside a honky-tonk before writing "Bubbles In My Beer," one of the greatest country and western drinking songs ever, for Bob Wills. Her material ranged from the smooth ballad "Anne Marie" for country crooner Jim Reeves to the pop of "Dream Baby" for Roy Orbison to the wacky "Barstool Cowboy From Old Barstow" for Spike Jones and the City Slickers.

"Cindy Walker never wrote a bad song in her life," Nashville producer Fred Foster said two years ago when the prolific first lady of country songwriting was feted with a tribute concert at the Paramount Theatre. The spritely, gregarious Walker, whose best-known composition, "You Don't Know Me," was recorded by everyone from Eddy Arnold and Ray Charles to Elvis Presley and Michael Bolton, got up and danced a jig in the aisles a few times during the Paramount show. It seemed like she would live forever.
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Jill Johnson for ENCORE

Cindy Walker, legendary Western songwriter, was inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame on Friday at the Worthington Hotel in Fort Worth.
But Walker, the subject of a new tribute album by Willie Nelson, died Thursday evening soon after being checked into a hospital in her native Mexia, about 40 miles east of Waco, with respiratory problems. She was 87.

"She affected me and everyone else who came along after her," Nelson said in a statement announcing the release of "You Don't Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker," which hit stores March 14. "We had to have heard her music before we could do ours."

The first woman inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, Walker said in a 2004 interview with the American-Statesman that in a career that spanned seven decades, with nearly 500 songwriting credits, she never experienced discrimination or thought of herself as a rarity in a male-dominated field.

"The one thing that everybody in the music business is always looking for is a good song," she said. "If you could write some, it didn't matter if you were male, female or orangutan."

Buoyant and unpretentious, calling everyone "Hon" and "Sweetie," this unflappable music pioneer seemed like someone who could've settled the West, instead of just writing songs about the new frontier.

She started writing songs, including future Wills hit "Dusty Skies" at age 12. Ten years later, Walker received her first songwriting credit when Bing Crosby recorded "Lone Star Trail" in 1941. Backed by her mother, Oree cq Walker, an exceptional piano player who fashioned her daughter's simple, direct melodies into full-fledged compositions, Walker became a tireless song plugger.

"I'm not intimidated by anyone," Walker said. "My father (a cotton buyer) didn't know the music business at all, but he told me to treat it like any other business. Know the market and sell, sell, sell."

The headstrong Walker always held her ground where her songs were concerned. Ernest Tubb wanted to record Walker's "China Doll," for instance, but he wanted to change the line "tiny pale hands" to "little brown hands." Walker refused. The china doll in her mind had tiny pale hands. Tubb declined to record the song, which was taken to the pop charts by the Ames Brothers.

Walker was briefly a Decca recording artist, hitting the Top 5 with "When My Blue Moon Turns To Gold Again" (which she didn't write) in 1944, and she played the sexy cowgirl in "soundies," three-minute flicks that played between Western double features. But songwriter was the role she truly relished.

Besides a gift for evocative lyrics and swaying melodies, Walker had a knack for crafting songs to the strengths of certain artists. Her most special writer/artist relationship was with Wills, "The King of Western Swing," who recorded more than 50 Walker songs, including "Cherokee Maiden," "Dusty Skies" and "Blue Bonnet Lane," all pitched to Wills on a single afternoon in Los Angeles, where the Walkers relocated in the 1940s.

The family moved back to Texas in 1954 and kept an apartment in Nashville, where Oree Walker, whom everyone called "Mama," was as known for her Southern cooking as well as piano playing.

Oree Walker, the daughter of gospel songwriting giant F. L. Eiland, passed away in 1991, which crushed Cindy, who'd only been married once, for a short period of time.

"I miss Mama every day," she said in 2004. "Every time I sit at the piano, Mama's grand piano, I remember how she played 'In the Misty Moonlight' (a hit Walker wrote for Jerry Wallace) the day before she died."

Walker laughed about how she used to get so excited when she finished a song that she'd sometimes wake her mother in the middle of the night to get her to play it. A song was never finished until Mama gave it her touch. "It'll be just as good in the morning," Oree Walker would say, then doze on back to sleep.

Cindy Walker lived out her life in the three-bedroom house her brother bought for their mother 50 years ago. Although old friends adored her and younger artists and songwriters figuratively kissed her feet at any opportunity, Walker said she didn't really like too many visitors.

"You can't write good songs with company dropping in," she said in 2004, a tunesmith to the core.

"She never stopped writing songs until the very end," said Casey Monahan of the Texas Music Office, who often talked to Walker on the phone. "Her last song was always her favorite."

Funeral services are scheduled for 10:30 a.m. Monday at the First Presbyterian Church, 209 E. Carthage St., in Mexia.

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COUNTRY MUSIC NEWS - The Voice of Country Music in Canada
CINDY WALKER
Obituary by Walt Trott
Country Music Hall of Famer (1997) Cindy Walker, 87, died in her hometown of Mexia, Texas, March 23, after suffering from respiratory problems.

A charter member of the Nashville Songwriters Association International?s Songwriters Hall of Fame (1970), Walker?s hits included Sugar Moon,Take Me In Your Arms and Hold Me, I Don?t Care,Cherokee Maiden and You Don?t Know Me.

All totaled, Cindy Walker had 52 Billboard country hits, recorded over several decades by such artists as Gene Autry, Bob Wills, Al Dexter, Eddy Arnold, Hank Snow, Webb Pierce, Ernest Tubb, Jim Reeves, Sonny James, Merle Haggard, Jack Greene, Mickey Gilley, Glen Campbell, Lacy J. Dalton and Ricky Skaggs.

Walker songs also hit the pop charts, notably China Doll (Ames Brothers), Dream Baby(Roy Orbison), You Don?t Know Me (Ray Charles) and In The Misty Moonlight (Jerry Wallace). Incidentally, Charles? cut on You Don?t Know Me also charted Top Five R&B.

Fred Foster, of Co-Heart Music, just completed production on Willie Nelson?s latest album You Don?t Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker for Lost Highway Records, released March 14.

?She had the album and loved it,? says Foster. ?Cindy was very excited about it. After listening to it, she had a comment about Willie. She thought he sounded better than he ever had. She especially liked ?It?s All Your Fault,? ?Miss Molly? and loved ?Don?t Be Ashamed Of Your Age.?

?Then she told me, ?Over the years, I had many artists record You Don?t Know Me, but when Willie sings it, it?s the only time I ever believed it.? She was very emotional when she said that. Willie actually called her up two or three times during the production process. That made her feel good. We also brought in (Texas fiddler) Johnny Gimble, and had Buddy Emmons (on steel), and what I call the rest of the super A Team (including Brent Mason, Eddie Bayers, Michael