Back when obituaries were obituaries: Commenting on my country music politicians trivia post yesterday, University of Tennessee Professor Robert Stepno informed me of yet another country-music politician, Robert Love (Fiddling Bob) Taylor, a three-time governor of Tennessee in the 1880s and 90s. He also served in the U.S. Senate and House. Robert (the professor, not the fiddler) points to an obituary that makes me long for the good old days when death notices included the important stuff:
“All his years in Congress made him none the less a mountaineer. He loved fried chicken better than a hound loves possum scraps. He drank his whiskey straight and he raised his hat to every woman he met. He could play the fiddle as no one else in the mountains, could ride a horse bareback and follow the hounds until the horn blew for breakfast the next day.”
They just don’t write ‘em like that anymore.
