The Goat That Launched a Country Star
True, odd moments from history, told short and checked against at least two sources.
The story
(19) Johnny Rodriguez became one of country music's biggest stars. And the story goes, it all started with a goat. (39) He grew up in Sabinal, Texas. In 1969, at eighteen, he ended up in the Uvalde County jail. The story goes he and his buddies tried to steal and barbecue a goat, and Rodriguez said he took the rap.
(38) But in that cell, he sang. Texas Ranger Joaquin Jackson heard him, and told his friend Happy Shahan, who ran Alamo Village, the old movie set from John Wayne's The Alamo. Shahan hired him to sing for tourists. (44) Country stars Tom T. Hall and Bobby Bare heard him there and said, try Nashville. He went with a guitar and, as the story goes, fourteen dollars. His first single, Pass Me By, hit the top ten, and he'd score six number-one country songs.
(23) The goat followed him for life. David Allan Coe even sang about it, and Rodriguez said fans still asked, what about them goats? (29) What really happened? The goat may be legend. Jackson later said it was an unpaid fine. But every account has the jailhouse singing. Rodriguez died in 2025, at seventy-three.
Sources
- pbs.org/kenburns/country-music/johnny-rodriguez-biography
- latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-sep-23-ca-25448-story.html
- maureenorth.com/1975/03/johnny-guitar-johnny-rodriguez/
- mrt.com/entertainment/entertainment_columnists/john_goodspeed/article/Fans-can-t
- upi.com/Archives/1987/10/30/Happy-Shahan/3180562568400/
- expressnews.com/news/article/johnny-rodriguez-tejano-country-music-star-death-20
- apnews.com/article/johnny-rodriguez-country-music-dies-a1afacf53548247e7aa3e0276
- tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/alamo-village