Marshall, Texas

Everything Marshall is known for

3 songs mention this city 3 artists from here

Music in Marshall

Songs About Marshall

Railroadin’ Some
Henry Thomas
5%
"Tyler, Longview, Jefferson, Marshall, Little Sandy, Big Sandy"
Something You Don't See Everyday
Jason Boland & The Stragglers
2%
"The bear bait made the border and I damn near went to jail"
Rumble In The Jungle
Fugees
"[Verse 1: Wyclef Jean] Thats like Ali versus Foreman (a-ha)"

Artists From Marshall

F
Floyd Dixon
r-n-b
W
Wes Jeans
blues
N
Nick Brumley
country

Rivers & Roads in Song near Marshall

Songs written about the waterways and highways that run near Marshall.

U.S. Route 59 9 songs Interstate 20 13 songs Sabine River 13 songs Interstate 49 4 songs US Route 71 2 songs Red River 87 songs

Musical Heritage

Boogie Woogie Fest RoadyGoat

That rolling, hard-driving piano — the boogie-woogie — they'll tell you it was born right here in Marshall. It came up out of the East Texas logging camps, where formerly enslaved men sat down at whatever piano they could find and played. Two of the greats came straight off these streets: Floyd Dixon and Dave Alexander. So it fits that Marshall finally got its own Boogie Woogie Fest — an idea Dale Watson floated and Alan Loudermilk, who runs the restaurant Gnocchio in town, talked him into making real. One September weekend, the lineup runs Dale Watson, Linda Gail Lewis, Wayne Hancock, Scott Biram, Jason D. Williams, and more. It's a party, sure. But it's also Marshall finally taking a bow for something it handed the whole world.

RoadyGoat →

Dale Watson RoadyGoat

Dale Watson's got the pompadour, the truck-driving country, the rockabilly snarl — and after decades in Austin and a stretch in Memphis, he landed in Marshall, East Texas, in twenty twenty. His thirtieth studio album is called "Starvation Box" — that was the name Lead Belly's father used for his son's guitar. And Lead Belly is the through-line here: Watson is helping build a Lead Belly museum right there in Marshall, and he kicked off the town's first Boogie Woogie Fest. The album itself is built around a nineteen fifty-seven twelve-string his wife gave him. One song, "Streets of Gold," came straight from his own father's stories of coal-mining life in Hazard, Kentucky. Thirty albums deep, and the man is still writing his roots into East Texas ground.

RoadyGoat →

Marshall RoadyGoat

Marshall, East Texas — twenty-three thousand people, deep in the Piney Woods, a town a lot of freedmen made home after the Civil War. You'll hear it called the birthplace of boogie woogie. Careful with that one: that claim traces back to a single researcher, who ran the numbers and figured Marshall sat closest to the center of gravity for all that early piano playing. What's not in doubt is the music itself — boogie woogie came up out of Black communities in the East Texas railroad and logging camps in the late eighteen hundreds, born on barrelhouse pianos. And Marshall still keeps the beat: third weekend of every month, live blues rolls through Telegraph Park downtown, in a hundred-and-sixteen-year-old city hall that plays music now instead of politics.

RoadyGoat →

Marshall as the birthplace of boogie-woogie RoadyGoat

1841

Marshall, Texas, founded 1841, calls itself the birthplace of boogie-woogie — and sure, a few other towns raise a hand at that. But hear Marshall out. The Texas and Pacific Railway rolled in about thirty years after the town went up and became one of the biggest employers around. Boogie-woogie got born in that world: African American workers in the late-1800s logging camps and rail yards, taking the chug and clatter of the trains and moving it onto a piano keyboard. Caddo Lake's just twenty minutes northeast. But here's the tell — one of the bedrock bass lines in the whole style is simply called "The Marshall." A rolling left hand, named after this town. Contest the birthplace all you like. Somebody in a rail yard here left their name on the low end.

RoadyGoat →

History of Marshall

Birthplace of Boogie Woogie RoadyGoat

Marshall, Texas is the birthplace of Boogie Woogie music, a piano-driven style that became a precursor to Rock and Roll. The city celebrates this heritage with an annual Boogie Woogie Festival and the Boogie Woogie Museum. Local blues guitarist Wes Jeans is another Marshall musician worth knowing. The city also hosts the Texas Sounds International Country Music Awards, essentially the Olympics of country music, drawing artists from around the world to compete each year.

Marshall, TX RoadyGoat

Marshall, Texas, has a rich history deeply intertwined with the American Civil War. As a crucial political and production area for the Confederate States, the city and its county were pivotal in the cotton plantation economy, which relied heavily on slave labor. Marshall became a major Confederate supply depot and manufacturer of gunpowder, hosting conferences of Trans-Mississippi and Indian Territory leaders. It even served as a temporary capital for the exiled Confederate government of Missouri, earning its nickname 'City of Seven Flags.' Post-war, Marshall was occupied by Union forces and later became a base for federal troops during Reconstruction, with an office of the Freedmen's Bureau established in the city.

Marshall, TX RoadyGoat

One of the most notable events in Marshall's history is its role during the American Civil War. The city became a major Confederate supply depot and manufacturer of gunpowder, hosting three conferences of Trans-Mississippi and Indian Territory leaders. It also served as a temporary capital for the exiled Confederate government of Missouri, earning its nickname 'City of Seven Flags.'

RoadyGoat →

Johnson, Claudia Alta Taylor [Lady Bird]

1912

First Lady of the United States (1963-1969), daughter of Thomas Jefferson Taylor and Minnie (Pattillo) Taylor, Claudia Alta Taylor was born in Karnack, Texas, on December 22, 1912. Mrs. Johnson's father was a landowner and merchant in Harrison County and a self-proclaimed "dealer in everything." Minnie Pattillo Taylor died from complications in a miscarriage when Claudia was five years old. A maternal aunt, Effie Pattillo, moved to Karnack to look after young Claudia and her two older brothers, Thomas, called Tommy (1901-1959) and Antonio, called Tony (1904-1986). During Claudia's early childhood, after her mother's death, a nursemaid, Alice Tittle, said that the little girl was "as purty [ sic ] as a lady bird." The nickname replaced her given name for the remainder of her life. Her father and brothers called her "Lady" and her husband called her "Bird," the name she used on her marriage license in 1934. Claudia made an attempt to escape the nickname when she changed schools to attend Marshall (Texas) High School. However, the arrival of former classmates brought her nickname with them and she was called Lady Bird for the rest of her life. She graduated from Marshall High School in 1928 and attended St. Mary's Episcopal School for Girls in Dallas, Texas, from 1928 to 1930. During her time at this residential junior college, she converted to the Episcopal faith. After graduating from St. Mary's School in 1930, Lady Bird attended a summer session at the University of Alabama (her mother's home state), but she decided to visit the University of Texas at Austin with a friend. On this visit, Lady Bird prophetically was awed at the sight of a field filled with wildflowers and the wildflowers clinched her college decision. Lady Bird Taylor received a Bachelor of Arts in history with honors in 1933 and a subsequent Bachelor of Journalism, cum laude in 1934. Her goal was a career in journalism, but she also earned a teaching certificate while she studied at the University of Texas at Austin. Lady Bird's career plans were changed forever when a mutual friend in Austin introduced her to Lyndon Baines Johnson , an aide to Congressman Richard Kleberg who represented the Fourteenth District. On their first date in October 1934 on a long drive in the country Lyndon Johnson proposed. Lady Bird initially resisted a rush to marriage, but Lyndon Johnson was prophetically persuasive, and the couple married on November 17, 1934, at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in San Antonio. Three years after their marriage, Lyndon Johnson decided to run for Congress from Austin's Tenth District and Lady Bird financed his campaign from her maternal inheritance. After his victory the Johnsons settled in Washington, D.C., and lived in suburban Virginia. Following the declaration of war in 1941 Congressman Johnson enlisted in the U.S. Navy, and Lady Bird ran the congressional office in his absence. Following the war the Johnsons experienced several miscarriages before the birth of two daughters-both born in Virginia-Lynda Johnson Robb (March 19, 1944) and Luci Johnson Turpin (July 2, 1947). In 1943 during World War II Lady Bird purchased radio station KTBC in Austin with money from her maternal inheritance and ultimately built this investment into the LBJ Holding Company (radio and television stations) that provided the major component of the family fortune. At the same time Lyndon Johnson's political career was ascendant: election to the United States Senate in 1948, reelection to the Senate in 1956, and rising to Vice President of the United States in 1960 as John F. Kennedy's running mate. At Kennedy's request Lady Bird Johnson substituted for the pregnant Jacqueline Kennedy and appeared at 150 events in 11 states during a 71-day period in the campaign. During a political fence-mending trip to Texas, Vice President Lyndon Johnson and Lady Bird Johnson were with President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy in Dallas when Kennedy was assassinated on

Tsha Handbook →

Ledbetter, Huddie [Lead Belly]

1918

Huddie Ledbetter, singer and guitarist, known as Lead Belly (also spelled Leadbelly), was born on January 21, 1888, near Mooringsport, Louisiana. He was the son of a Black tenant farmer, Wesley Ledbetter, and his half Indian wife, Sally (or Sallie) Pugho. Ledbetter attended public schools in Louisiana, then in East Texas after his family purchased a small farm when he was ten. The family was listed in the 1900 census for Harrison County. Having learned to play the six-string guitar, he left home in 1901 to make his way as a minstrel, first on Fannin Street in Shreveport, and later in Dallas and Fort Worth. He spent summers working as a farmhand in the blackland counties east of Dallas and supplemented his income by singing and playing his guitar in saloons and dance halls during the winter. While working in Dallas, he met Blind Lemon Jefferson , and it was as his partner that Ledbetter first began to play the twelve-string guitar. In 1918, under the name of Walter Boyd, Ledbetter was convicted of murder and sentenced to thirty years in the Texas penitentiary. Either prior to his sentence or during it, the musician received his famous nickname, Lead Belly. Some reports say that he got it for taking a gunshot in the stomach; others suggest that fellow inmates gave it to him for his hard work and fast pace on the chain gangs. In any case, it sounds like his surname. Pardoned in 1925 after having written a song in honor of Governor Pat Neff , Lead Belly again lived from odd jobs until 1930, when he entered the state prison in Angola, Louisiana, on a charge of assault with intent to murder. There his music attracted Texas folklorist John Avery Lomax and his son Alan Lomax . Lead Belly was released from prison for having received credit for "good time" during his incarceration, and for several months he toured with the Lomaxes, giving concerts and assisting them in their efforts to record the work songs and spirituals of Black convicts. Soon after arriving in New York City with the Lomaxes, Lead Belly came to national prominence through his singing and unconventional background. Despite his growing musical reputation, he continued to have problems controlling his temper and found himself briefly incarcerated for assault in 1939 on Riker's Island. Ironically, his popularity was stronger in the White folk-music scene than the Black blues field. His associates included Woody Guthrie , Pete Seeger, and Sonny Terry. His original songs such as "Bourgeois Blues" and "Scottsboro Boys" reflected his politics. Lead Belly's most popular composition, "Goodnight Irene," achieved its greatest success when the Weavers recorded it in the early 1950s, after his death. Ledbetter's association in 1905 with Margaret Coleman produced two children. In 1916 he married Eletha Henderson; the two were later divorced. He married Martha Promise, from Louisiana, in 1935. Ledbetter died of Lou Gehrig's disease in New York City on December 6, 1949. He was buried at Shiloh Baptist Church, north of Shreveport, Louisiana. In 1988 Louisiana erected a historical marker at his gravesite. In 1980 the Nashville Songwriters Association International inducted him into their Hall of Fame. That honor was followed in 1986 with membership in the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame, and in 1988 Lead Belly's work was honored by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. His niece, Queen "Tiny" Robinson, established the Lead Belly Foundation in his honor. He was inducted into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2008.

Tsha Handbook →

Farmer, James Leonard, Jr.

1942

James Leonard Farmer, Jr., civil rights leader and founder of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), was born on January 12, 1920, in Marshall, Texas, to James Leonard Farmer, Sr. , and Pearl Marion Houston Farmer. His father was a professor of religion at Wiley College. When James Jr. was six months old the family moved to Holly Springs, Mississippi, where his father taught at Rust College. In 1925 the family moved to Austin, Texas, where James Sr. joined the faculty at Samuel Huston College (now Huston-Tillotson College). After a move to Atlanta, Georgia, in 1930, the Farmer family moved back to Marshall, Texas, in 1933. He graduated at age fourteen from Pemberton High in Marshall and, with a four-year scholarship, entered Wiley College that same year. There, under the guidance of Melvin B. Tolson , he became a member of the 1935 debate team that defeated the national champions from the University of Southern California. Tolson, Farmer, and the success of the Wiley debate team were the subjects of a 2007 film, The Great Debaters , which starred Denzel Washington. After his 1938 graduation from Wiley, Farmer entered Howard University in Washington, D.C., and intended to become a minister in the Methodist Church. Under the wing of Professor Howard Thurman, Farmer was introduced to the concept of nonviolent protest pioneered by Mohandas Gandhi. He graduated from Howard University with a Bachelor of Divinity degree in 1941. Farmer intended to enter the Methodist ministry, but in 1941, the year he would have been ordained, the Methodist Church North and South reunited and isolated its African American members into a segregated jurisdiction. Rejecting the pulpit, Farmer chose instead to lead the fight against Jim Crow laws. Farmer went to work for the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR) in Chicago and in 1942 led other members of FOR to form what he called the Committee of Racial Equality. The name was soon changed to the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and its initial activities were sit-ins in the restaurants of Chicago. During the following decade he was employed by the NAACP as its program director (1959-60), and he worked with several labor unions seeking to end racial segregation . In 1961 he became the executive director of CORE. Convinced that mere victory in court cases would not provide equality, he decided to employ the confrontational but nonviolent tactics he had learned under Tolson and Thurman to challenge segregation in the bus stations of the South. After a brief first marriage to Winnie Christie in 1945, Farmer married Lula Peterson in 1949. His wife played an important, though volunteer, role as comptroller of CORE until her death in 1977. The couple had two daughters, Tami and Abbey. In May 1961, with twelve other Black and White members of CORE, Farmer set out from Washington, D.C., on two buses headed for New Orleans. The Freedom Rides had begun. The death of his father when the Freedom Riders reached Atlanta sent Farmer back to Washington, D.C. In his absence one of the buses was torched in Anniston, Alabama, and freedom riders on the other were brutally beaten when the bus rolled into Montgomery, Alabama. Farmer rejoined the freedom rides a week later and was jailed in Mississippi's Parchman Prison for thirty-nine days, the first of many times he clashed with local law enforcement officers in the South. He was incarcerated in Plaquemine, Louisiana, in 1963, for example, and was unable to attend Martin Luther King's March on Washington, D.C. In 1964 the murder of three CORE workers-Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney-during the "Freedom Summer" effort to register voters in Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana, galvanized the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the national press. Farmer wrote of his CORE experiences in Freedom, When? (1965). Unhappy with the militant direction CORE was taking, Farmer resigned his position as director in 1966. He taught classes at Lincoln University in Penn

Tsha Handbook →

Starr, James Harper

1861

Connecticut-born. Came to Texas 1837. A doctor in Nacogdoches. Secretary of the Treasury and army surgeon, Republic of Texas. At start of Civil War appointed to take and sell the property of enemy aliens, the proceeds going to Treasury of Confederacy to aid the war effort. Became Postmaster General for western C.S.A. in 1864. The South was then spit in two parts by federal control of the Mississippi River. Starr's problem was to provide mail service in Louisiana, Arkansas and Texas and to devise means to get mail through the enemy military lines and naval blockade to and from westerners fighting east of the river and the confederate capital. This was essential to soldier and home front morale and to maintain necessary military and governmental communications. The mail was carried by pony express, wagons, blockade running vessels, stage coach lines, couriers, spies and army details. Starr competed with the army to get drivers, wagons and horses. Draft by military of postal employees was fought by writs of habeas corpus. "Men" under 16 were hired. Printing facilities were limited and forms, supplies, stamps had to be smuggled. The children of a cabinet officer once came through enemy lines with $3,000,000 worth of stamps for him. After the war, Starr in 1865 looked into East Texas oil showings. He founded Marshall's first bank. Starr county was named in his honor. Erected by the State of Texas 1963

Historical Marker →

Clark, Edward, Governor

1861

(1815-1880) Hometown Texas First Confederate Governor Son of a Georgia governor. Came here in 1842. Member Annexation Convention, 1st and 2nd Texas Legislatures. Participant Mexican War. Secretary of State 1853-7. Elected Lieutenant Governor 1859. Made Governor 1861 upon removal of Gov. Sam Houston, who opposed secession. Clark's major activity was mobilizing Texas in cause of Confederacy. Plans were made to prevent federal invasion, take over enemy property, organize resources to provide supplies and arms for defense, and to properly care for families of Texas soldiers battling at the front. Gov. Edward Clark's term from March to November 1861 also faced difficulties caused by mechanics of changing flags, seals, currency, postal and tax systems for membership in new nation. Camps of instruction were set-up over state to enroll, equip and train troops. Hardest job was to convince Texans, the best horsemen in world, that all could not ride in cavalry but some must be foot soldiers in infantry. The C.S.A. was supplied guns, powder, lead, cloth made in penitentiary, salt and 20,000 troops in his term. In late 1861 he raised and became colonel 14th Tex. Inf. Regt. Led units in Arkansas-Louisiana campaigns to prevent invasion of Texas. Wounded and commended Battle Pleasant Hill April 1864. Discharged 1865. Postwar lawyer, businessman. Buried in Marshall Cemetery.

Historical Marker →

First Baptist Church

1845

John Bryce (1784-1864), Baptist missionary and secret agent for U. S. President John Tyler during Texas annexation negotiations, and the Rev. George Washington Baines, great-grandfather of President Lyndon Baines Johnson, founded this church shortly before Texas became a state in 1845. Dr. William Evans, Marshall's first physician, and other leaders of the pioneer community were among the twelve charter members. Throughout its history, this fellowship has included men and women who were leaders in the city, state, and Baptist faith. Services were held in a brush arbor or nearby log schoolhouse until 1849, when a church building was erected on this lot, donated by State Legislator James McCown (1808-55). The small frame structure was replaced by a larger building in 1892. Members of this congregation organized the Second Baptist Church in 1904. They also helped establish the College of Marshall in 1912. This junior college later became East Texas Baptist College, a four-year school which is still actively supported by this church. The present sanctuary was constructed in 1953, and the children's building was completed in 1955. A new education building and chapel were erected in 1972, completing the church complex.

Historical Marker →

Things to Do in Marshall

quirky 14.6 mi away
Jay Goulds Curse on Jefferson

When railroad baron Jay Gould rolled into Jefferson in the 1870s he had a simple proposition: let me bring my railroad through town. The city fathers flush…
historical 14.7 mi away
The Great Raft That Built a City

For centuries an 80-mile logjam called the Great Raft choked the Red River so completely that it backed water all the way up into Caddo Lake. That accidental…
historical 18.0 mi away
The Diamond Bessie Murder

On a winter day in 1877 a well-dressed couple crossed the bridge over Cypress Bayou carrying a picnic basket. He was Abraham Rothschild heir to a jewelry…
quirky 19.1 mi away
Caddo Lake

The only natural lake in Texas is also the most haunted-looking -- twenty-five thousand acres of bald cypress swamp draped in Spanish moss straddling the…
quirky 14.7 mi away
The Grove — Americas Most Haunted House

Built in 1861 in the middle of Jeffersons boom years The Grove looks like any other graceful Southern home from the outside. Inside is another story entirely.…
quirky 14.7 mi away
Spielberg Fled the Excelsior House

The Excelsior House has been hosting guests since the 1850s and most of them sleep just fine. Steven Spielberg was not one of them. The story goes that the…
spooky 14.7 mi away
The Jefferson Hotel

One of the most haunted hotels in the South. Built in the 1850s in the once-booming riverport of Jefferson. Guests report phantom footsteps slamming doors and…
historical 14.7 mi away
Last Confederate Powder Magazine in Texas

In 1863 with the Civil War grinding on the Confederacy needed a safe place to store gunpowder and ammunition deep in the Texas interior. They built an ordnance…

Everything Near Marshall

455 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the nearest 200 are listed here — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

Explore Marshall on the Map
All music from Texas → · Browse more cities