The brutal murders marked a turning point in Nashville history. We started looking over our shoulders and wondering what was happening.
For a year, I couldn't hardly talk about it. It was devastating. A sad time. A trying time. I don't think you ever get over something like that. Our lives were never the same after that.
Board spokeswoman Melissa McDonald said it could take several weeks before Brown gets out of the facility where he is being held. On the evening of Nov. Stringbean was known to carry a lot of cash, and the Brown cousins had been looking for it in the Akemans' cabin in Ridgetop, 20 miles north of Nashville.
John Brown shot Stringbean as he walked into cabin. He then chased Estelle across her front yard and shot her in the back of the head as she begged for mercy. Both men were convicted and sentenced to serve two life sentences in prison. He also played on one recording session as a Blue Grass Boy, laying down eight tracks in February Stringbeans left Monroe's band in the fall and was replaced by another legendary banjo player, the great Earl Scruggs , who had a radically different technique than the old-style favored by Akeman and Grandpa Jones.
Stringbean, who married Estelle Stanfill in , first began working with Grandpa Jones , another comic-banjo player, in He later teamed up with Lew Childre to create a comedy-musical duo act in the late s, and they became regulars at the Grand Old Opry.
After Macon's death in , Stringbean as he now was known, became one of the Opry's biggest stars. By the early s, Earl Scruggs had become the most influential and popular banjo player in country music, and it was at this time that Stringbean first decided to record on his own, signing with the Starday label. There was still an audience for his traditional style of banjo playing and his admixture of comedy and song, best exemplified by the title of his first album: "Old Time Pickin' and Grinnin' with Stringbean," which was released in The album featured folk songs, particularly humorous ditties about animals, and jokes and tall tales.
He would release a total of seven albums all together from the early 60s through , and had country hits with "Chewing Gum" and "I Wonder Where Wanda Went.
Just like at the Grand Old Opry, Stringbean became one of the most beloved of the show's stars. Dave Akeman lived an extremely modest, simple life. Remembering the hard times of the Depression, Stringbean and his wife lived in a tiny cabin near Ridgetop, Tennessee, approximately 20 miles outside of Nashville, near his friend Grandpa Jones.
Their only luxury was a Cadillac. Stringbean did not trust banks due to the multiple bank failures of the Hoover years, and he kept thousands of dollars on his person, which he was known to flash around. It was rumored in nearby Nashville that Stringbean had a fortune in cash stashed at his house. It was these rumors that led two cousins, John and Marvin Brown, on the night of November 10, , to break into the Akemans' cabin. And now, murder was accompanied by a frenzied and elongated publicity campaign, as the investigation and trial played out.
Stringbean Akeman already had taped a year's worth of "Hee Haw" episodes, so he remained a contemporary television star even as prosecutors tried his killers. I remember hearing about it on the radio, when we were driving back home from South Carolina.
After that, I remember watching 'Hee Haw' and seeing String on it, and I didn't understand how he could be on the television and be dead. The past 40 years have brought expansion and enrichment to Nashville. It is now a metropolis that String and Estelle Akeman would not recognize. Their little cabin has gotten a couple of facelifts, but the property Mac Wiseman calls "a hallowed place" is still recognizable. Musicians Brian and Tiffany Buchanan bought the cabin this year, moving from East Nashville in part because of neighborhood worries: Concerned about rising crime, they moved to country music's most legendary crime scene.
They cook in the kitchen where Doug Brown hid as Stringbean Akeman opened the door, 40 years ago. On the mantle above the fireplace, they've placed Stringbean memorabilia, including an album cover that features Akeman sitting in front of that fireplace. They often explore Baker Station cave, accessible from their backyard: Stringbean Akeman used to hang hams in that cave.
And, in a full-circle happenstance, Brian Buchanan doesn't drive; Tiffany Buchanan takes him to work in Nashville. One of Stringbean and Estelle's killers, Doug Brown, died in , ending his life sentence to prison. John Brown, who fired the pistol that killed Stringbean in a struggle and Estelle Akeman as she fled, is now The Tennessee Board of Probation and Parole has declined his requests for release four times, with the Akemans' friends from the "Opry" appearing at hearings to oppose his release.
He was released on parole in November of In the months after the couple was murdered, police turned the cabin into an investigation headquarters, and they searched every inch of the place.
Murder cost Gibson one job and gained him another. With Snow, Gibson went to play at Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison and San Quentin shows had been well-received, and other stars were doing similar concerts and one of the Brown boys was assigned to carry sound equipment. If I could say anything from him to you, it would be that he'd want you to do something good to help others.
Then Hank Snow found out that the Brown boys were in the audience and refused to go on with the show. Forty years to the day of the killings, Stringbean and Estelle Akeman are remembered as people of simple kindnesses and endearing peculiarities. They are remembered for their disquieting final moments, but it is not those moments that define them. They were killed for greed and for meanness, by desperate people. But they themselves were contented people, secure and unworried.
The murders of Stringbean and Estelle helped create a Nashville world with which they never could have been at peace. These were not modern people. Even 40 years ago, they were beautiful anachronisms. Their likes will not again be known.
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