Jack Guthrie

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Jack Guthrie (13 November 1915–15 January 1948) was born Leon Jerry Guthrie in Olive, Oklahoma, USA. He was a cousin of Woody Guthrie and had a hit record on the country and western charts with a rewritten version of a Woody Guthrie song "Oklahoma Hills" (1945). At the time the record became a hit Jack Guthrie was in the U.S. Army and stationed in the Pacific Theater. As soon as he got out of the service he wrote and recorded more songs, played live gigs up and down the West Coast and had other chart hits including the "Oakie Boogie", a hit at number three in 1947 and a candidate for the first rock and roll record. In July 1947 he was admitted to a hospital with tuberculosis. He died in 1948 in Livermore, California.