Soon there won’t be anyone left to offer personal stories of meeting and talking to Hank Williams. I guess we should say that anyone with a first hand personal story of Hank should make sure it is recorded somewhere for posterity. Or if anyone is in possession of a guaranteed accurate written account from someone who has passed away, should make sure it is preserved. I guess the Hank Williams’ Museum would take care of items like that.
Here’s a remembrance from Miller Williams (no relation) a well known Arkansas poet, published in the Arkansas literary magazine the ‘Oxford American’. Notice, he is the father of the very well known and well respected true American Country contemporary singer songwriter Lucinda Williams.
Yes, [in 1952] I was on the faculty of McNeese State College in Lake Charles, Louisiana, when he had a concert there. I stepped onstage when he and his band were putting their instruments away and when he glanced at me I said, “Mr. Williams, my name is Williams and I’d be honored to buy you a beer.” To my surprise, he asked me where we could get one. I said there was a gas station about a block away where we could sit and drink a couple. (You may not be aware that gas stations used to have bars.) He asked me to tell his bus driver exactly where it was and then he joined me. When he ordered his beer, I ordered a glass of wine, because this was my first year on a college faculty and it seemed the appropriate thing to do. We sat and chatted for a little over an hour. When he ordered another beer he asked me about my family. I told him that I was married and that we were looking forward to the birth of our first child in about a month. He asked me what I did with my days and I told him that I taught biology at McNeese and that when I was home I wrote poems. He smiled and told me that he had written lots of poems. When I said, “Hey—you write songs!” he said, “Yeah, but it usually takes me a long time. I might write the words in January and the music six or eight months later; until I do, what I’ve got is a poem.” Then his driver showed up, and as he stood up to leave he leaned over, put his palm on my shoulder, and said, “You ought to drink beer, Williams, ’cause you got a beer-drinkin’ soul.” He died the first day of the following year. When Lucinda was born I wanted to tell her about our meeting, but I waited until she was onstage herself. Not very long ago, she was asked to set to music words that he had left to themselves when he died. This almost redefines coincidence.
Here is a link to the article.
http://www.oxfordamerican.org/articles/2013/mar/05/poet-interview-miller-williams/
