Description
Singer, songwriter, and actor Eugene “Smokey” Rogers (1917-1993) was a successful and influential part of the country music
scene in Southern California in the 1940s and 1950s. He performed in bands with Spade Cooley and Tex Williams, hosted his
own TV show in San Diego, and co-founded the Valley Music store in El Cajon, California. His wife Maymie Anderson (1918-2001)
was the first female mayor of Maywood, California. This archival collection includes photos, sheet music, recordings, and
personal papers mostly spanning 1931-1997, and documents Rogers’s professional life and the personal lives of Rogers and Anderson.
Background
Eugene Throckmorton “Smokey” Rogers was born in McMinnville, Tennessee on 1917 March 23. His musical success began when he
was only 8 years old when he won an amateur banjo contest on radio station WJR in Detroit. Five years later, when Rogers was
13, he joined the Detroit band Jack West & His Circle Star Cowboys. In 1935 at the age of 18, Rogers met and formed country
music quartet Texas Jim Lewis’s Lone Star Cowboys with Larry “Pedro” DePaul, “Texas” Jim Lewis, and Andrew “Cactus” Soldi.
The quartet secured a year-long gig playing at the Village Barn in New York City, and then proceeded to tour the United States.
They settled in Southern California in the late 1930s and made a living performing their music in clubs and in short musical
films.Maymie Ree Anderson had come to Southern California from Alabama with five siblings and their single mother during the Great
Depression. Anderson lied to get a nighttime waitressing job at age 15 so that she could help support her family and still
attend school. Anderson married her first husband, Andy Anderson, when she was only 16. They had two children together, Richard
and Frances, and later adopted another child, Sandra. Together, the Andersons ran several restaurants in Maywood, California.
Maywood had a tumultuous past, and crime was on the rise in the early 1960s. After a 12-year-old girl was murdered, Maymie
Anderson started speaking out and was elected as the first female mayor of Maywood, California in 1964. Maymie also claimed
to be the first female member of the Toastmasters International, signing up in 1967.
Extent
2.0 Linear feet
(4 boxes)
Restrictions
Copyright has not been assigned to the Autry National Center. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts
must be submitted in writing to the Autry Archivist. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the Autry National Center
as the custodian of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must
also be obtained by the reader.
Availability
Collection is open for research. Appointments to view materials are required. To make an appointment please visit http://theautry.org/research/research-rules-and-application
or contact library staff at rroom@theautry.org.