Johnny Cash was born in February, 1932 in the small town of Kingsland in the Southern hill country of Arkansas.  It was harsh time in the region as the Great Depression had crippled agriculture and farming families like the Cash's were struggling to make ends meet.  Ray and Carrie Cash and their six children needed a change.  

Ray and Carrie Cash pose with their growing family on the Porch of their new home in the Dyess Colony in Northeast Arkansas.  Photo circa 1935, credit:  Arkansas State University.

FDR's New Deal brought new opportunity, thankfully, and the growing Cash family packed up and moved to a resettlement community called the Dyess Colony in Northeastern Arkansas.  The land was more fertile there and the Colony provided housing and some basic necessities for its members.  The family cleared 20 acres of land and everyone went to work growing and picking cotton -- even five year old Johnny!

Life was hard there, however.  Johnny worked long hours under a strict father, but was encouraged by his songbird mother.  Tragedy struck the family in 1944 when Jack Cash, Johnny's older brother and best friend, died in a mill accident on the farm.  Riddled with grief and guilt, Johhny became obsessed with the singers heard on an uncle's battery-powered radio, and soon after, he was writing poems, songs, and stories.  These pictures show a bit more about his life and how Johnny grew up. 

 

The Dyess Colony was an active community at its peak in the 1930's and early 1940s.  This photo shows a look inside the community canning and processing center.

 

This photo courtesy of Arkansas State University shows the Cash family home before they began recent renovations.  This image helps give you a sense of how cramped it must have been for a family of nine!

Johnny (J.R. by birth) and his older brother Jack Cash around 1934 or 1935.  Though the photo is dated 1936, it as likely taken a year or two earlier. 

 

Jack and Johnny Cash on their family's cotton land in Dyess around 1939

 

Here is a rare photo of Johnny from his 1948 Dyess School yearbook.  He was known as J.R. at the time, still.  

 

The Cash Family in 1949.  Johnny is standing on the far right.  

 

Joanne, Johnny, and Tommy Cash in 1950.  Johnny is heading off to the Air Force.

June and Johnny Cash returned to visit Johnny's childhood home in 1969.

 

Another image of Mr. Cash during a much later visit to his boyhood home.  This is a view from the backyard. 

 

Though the Cash family home fell under disrepair long after the family left Dyess, Arkansas State University and Roseanne Cash invested in a full restoration and recently opened the home to visitors as an ASU Heritage Site.  You can now tour the home and take a trip back to the 1930's and see how young Johnny lived.  What a fitting tribute to his legacy!

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