Lee "Zeke" Allen Wade "Hy" Allen Bill Crane "Booger" Fields Whitey Ford[1] Florence "Mommie" Gray Owen "Zeb" Gray Polly Jenkins[2] "Chief" Sanders Rube Tronson Fred Wilson *NOTE: Zeke Clements played with another band, Ken Hackley's Oklahoma Cowboys
Otto Gray and his Oklahoma Cowboys were the first nationally famous cowboy western music band[3] in the United States, and the first cowboy band to appear on the cover of Billboard (June 6, 1931).[4]
Formed in Ripley, Oklahoma in the early 1920s, the band was first known as McGinty's Oklahoma Cowboy Band, for the leader, Billy McGinty, a well-known cowboy, former Rough Rider, and world champion rider with Buffalo Bill's show.
The band members were authentic cowboys from ranches in and around Ripley. Their first promoter, George Youngblood, introduced them saying, "I wish to say of this bunch of cowboys that they are not only good fiddlers, but can ride or rope anything that has horns, hide or hair." After McGinty left to become the postmaster of Ripley, Otto Gray (1884–1967), took over as bandleader as well as manager. With the extensive traveling generated from their popularity, the original band members dropped out to stay with their jobs and families. Gray filled their places with professional musicians willing to spend most of their time on the road.
Playing on the vaudeville circuits in the Midwest and Northeast, and nationwide over some 130 radio stations, they played the first cowboy music most Americans outside of the West had ever heard.
One of their most popular tunes was "Midnight Special", performed by member Dave "Pistol Pete" Cutrell;[5] Cutrell's "Pistol Pete's Midnight Special" with McGinty's band was also the first version of "Midnight Special" ever recorded.[6]
The band lasted until the early 1930s when economic situations led them to disband.
^Wolfe, Women of Country Music, p. 3: "Traveling with Gray at the same time was Benjamin Francis "Whitey" Ford, who later became famous to radio audiences as the Duke of Paducah."
^Wolfe, Women of Country Music, p. 3: "In addition to traveling just with her own band, Polly worked with other acts during the 1930s. Among these were Otto Gray and His Oklahoma Cowboys, ..."
^Shirley, "Daddy of The Cowboy Bands", p. 6: "Otto Gray, who put the first all-string cowboy band on stage, radio and records, is the acknowledged 'daddy of 'em all.'"
^Chlouber, "Otto Gray and his Oklahoma Cowboys", p. 371: "Otto Gray and his Oklahoma cowboys appeared on the cover of Billboard on June 6, 1931, the first country or western band to be featured on the magazine's cover."
^McRill, "Music in Oklahoma by the Billy McGinty Cowboy Band", p. 70: "His special song which was called for every time he appeared on any program was entitled 'The Midnight Special'."
^Cohen, Long Steel Rail, p 479:"The first commercial recording of 'The Midnight Special' was made in 1926 by Dave Cutrell, with McGinty's Oklahoma Cowboy Band, for OKeh Label; ..."
Chlouber, Carla. "Otto Gray and his Oklahoma Cowboys: The Country's First Commercial Western Band". Chronicles of Oklahoma, (Winter, 1997–98) 75:4 356-383.
Cohen, Norm. Long Steel Rail: The Railroad in American Folksong. University of Illinois Press (2nd ed), 2000. ISBN0-252-06881-5
