On Merle Haggard
Johnny Cash may have sang the “Folsom Prison Blues,” but it was Merle Haggard who actually lived them, at San Quentin in the 1950s. He was right in the middle of living them, in fact, when Cash came to Quentin to sing them. Changed his whole damn life, pretty much. Before making it to the big house, his crimes had all been juvenile offenses—truancy and larceny and the like—but at the age of 20 he held up a bar in Bakersfield and got three years max-security. That’s when he heard Cash sing in a way that changed him all around. He had direction, now. Some of the guys were intent on breaking out, and offered Haggard the chance to go along with them. He said thanks but no th