Vivian took her familiar place at the window and let the girls, who now numbered four, stay up late to greet their father, whom they hadn’t seen in months. Though Cash was showing up less and less often, she held out hope that he would be home one night in June 1965 after his manager, Saul Holiff, phoned to say that Johnny was on the way. and tried to grab a few hours sleep before getting the girls ready for class at St.

On most nights, Vivian gave up around 1 a.m. Vivian imagined him in the arms of June Carter, or dead somewhere of a drug overdose, and she prayed to see the headlights in the driveway that would prove her wrong. One of the most vivid childhood memories of Cash’s two oldest daughters, Rosanne and Kathy, was watching their mother, Vivian, puffing anxiously on a cigarette as she stared through the living room window of their Casitas Springs home on those rare nights when she thought her husband might actually be coming home. REVIEW: ‘My Father and the Man in Black’ goes inside Johnny Cash

The year 1965 would bring particular humiliation and pain. As he fell deeper into drugs, his behavior became so self-destructive that those around him feared for his life. Hating confrontation, Cash stopped coming home for months at a time and struck up affairs with other women, notably June Carter, who joined his touring group in 1962. His trademark “boom-chicka-boom” instrumental sound (pioneered by guitarist Luther Perkins) felt as steady and affirming as an amplified heartbeat. Cash, whose musical approach was flavored by elements of folk, blues and gospel music, wasn’t a great singer technically, but the heart of his music conveyed elements of human struggle with inspiration and conviction.

Thanks to such hits as “I Walk the Line” and “Folsom Prison Blues,” he was the hottest young country artist in years and had just been lured away from tiny Sun Records by Columbia Records. Ĭash, 26, moved to California with his wife, Vivian, and his first three daughters in the summer of 1958, hoping for a career in the movies. 13 Arts & Books section said the Doors appeared on the singer’s television show. Johnny Cash: An article about Johnny Cash in the Oct. Johnny Cash’s life in the 1960s is mostly remembered as a time of glorious achievement - from the landmark prison albums at Folsom and San Quentin to the launch of the ABC-TV series featuring such guests as Bob Dylan and the Doors that led to his becoming a giant figure in popular culture, a symbol to millions, no less, of the best of American social values.īut Cash also experienced excruciatingly dark times in the decade, fueled by drugs and guilt over the breakup of his marriage.

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