Lonesome Cowgirls and Honky Tonk Angels: The Women of Barn Dance Radio

Popular between the two world wars, American barn dance radio evoked comforting images of a nostalgic and stable past for listeners beset by economic problems at home and worried about totalitarian governments abroad. Sentimental images such as the mountain mother and the chaste everybody’s-little-sister girl singer helped to sell a new consumer culture and move commercial country music from regional fare to national treasure. Drawing on personal interviews and rich archival material from the Grand Ole Opry , Kristine M. McCusker examines the gendered politics of these images through the lives and careers of six women performers: Linda Parker, the Girls of the Golden West (Milly and Dolly Good), Lily May Ledford, Minnie Pearl, and Rose Lee Maphis.