Aroostook County
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(Continued from page 45) formances proved to be too much for him. He returned to Maine and isolated himself to recover from illness and fatigue. After Event Records dissolved, one of its former owners created a new record label in Boston known as Tiffany Records. Faithful to Curless, he had him record his debut album “Dick Curless Sings Songs of the Open Country” that consisted of pre-recorded singles of “I Dreamed of a Hillbilly Heaven” and “Deck of Cards.” This was also the time when Curless met a well-known copywriter and radio host, Dan Fulkerson, who wrote and dedicated the song, “A Tombstone Every Mile” to him. The song’s lyrics told the story about an extremely dangerous stretch of highway through the Haynesville Woods Mountain Range, where many truckers had died. The touching and tragic lyrics included stanzas such as: All you big men who roll the trucks along Better listen you’ll be thankful when you hear my song You have really got it made if you’re haulin’ goods
Anyplace on earth but those Hangsville Woods It’s a stretch of road up north in Maine That’s never ever ever seen a smile If they’d buried all them truckers lost in them woods There’d be a tombstone every mile When the song was recorded and released in 1965, it became endeared to the hearts of truck drivers throughout the country. Due to the single’s success, Tower Records bought the rights to all of his Tiffany albums, and Curless signed a deal to re-issue the albums, including “Tombstone Every Mile.” The song received a top-five listing on Billboard’s country charts and it remained in the Country Music Top Ten throughout the summer. From 1966 to 1968, Curless toured the nation with the “Buck Owens All American Show,” and eventually recorded 22 Top-40 hits by the end of his career, including “Big Wheel Cannonball” and “Hard, Hard Traveling Man.” After his success in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Curless recorded in-
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frequently but continued to release a slow stream of Top-20 Country Music hits. According to a “Black Cat Rockabilly” article written by Pete Hoppula, “In 1973, Capitol Records released the fabulous live LP, “Live at the Wheeling Truck Drivers Jamboree” produced by Joe Allison. He also moved to Branson, Missouri, recorded for some indie-labels, and toured the Northeast and Canada. In 1975 Dick had most of his stomach removed, but he never really recovered from his health problems. His last albums somehow foretold his eventual fate, which included titles such as “Welcome to My World” and “It’s Just a Matter of Time” (recorded in 1987) and the highly emotional “Traveling Through” (recorded in 1995). On May 25, 1995, the “Baron of Country Music” finally succumbed to stomach cancer and he died at the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Togus, Maine. As stated in his song “Whispering Hope,” perhaps
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