Duke of Paducah
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Benjamin Francis Ford (May 12, 1901 – June 20, 1986), known professionally as The Duke of Paducah, was an American
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comedian, radio host and banjo player popular from the 1940s to the 1960s. Ford was born in De Soto, Missouri, and was raised in
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. He had only a third-grade education, so he joked that he came from the "university of hard knocks". He enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1918. During his Navy service he learned to play the banjo and earned his nickname Whitey Ford because of his blond hair. After his discharge in 1922, he joined McGinty's Oklahoma Cowboy Band, a Dixieland jazz group, as a banjo player. The group later changed its name to
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and appeared in a few
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film shorts. In 1929, Ford made his debut on
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in
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, Illinois. A serious man off stage, he lit up on screen. In the early 1930s, while working at KWK in
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, Ford took the stage name The Duke of Paducah. In 1937, he founded the ''
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'' with
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and John Lair. More radio work followed when he became a regular on ''Plantation Party'', an
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show in
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and Chicago. From 1942–1959, Ford was a regular on the
Grand Ole Opry The ''Grand Ole Opry'' is a weekly American country music stage concert in Nashville, Tennessee, founded on November 28, 1925, by George D. Hay as a one-hour radio "barn dance" on WSM. Currently owned and operated by Opry Entertainment (a divis ...
where he became a member. He also hosted several popular radio shows broadcast nationally. In the mid-1950s, Ford toured with a troupe he called the Rock and Roll Revue. On several occasions, he shared a bill with
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. In 1958, he began hosting an early morning television show, ''Country Junction'', on
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in
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, which he hosted for several years, being succeeded by
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Eddie Hill. Ford ended his act with his tagline: "I'm goin' back to the wagon, boys, these shoes are killin' me." He was elected to the
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in February 1986.


Notes


References


Country Music Hall of Fame profileAnswers.comElvis ClubBoards Radio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Duke of Paducah 1901 births 1986 deaths People from De Soto, Missouri American male comedians Grand Ole Opry members American radio personalities American television personalities Country Music Hall of Fame inductees Starday Records artists 20th-century American singers Comedians from Missouri 20th-century American comedians