Customer Reviews

Ain't Nothin' As Sweet As My Baby : The Story of Hank Williams' Lost Daughter

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The premise of this book is so sad it makes me want to cry. Hank Williams was an unreliable country singer (like George Jones who came along later), who did things he would not have done had he not been on drugs and a hard drinker. Before his death, he signed a written contract that a child had been born to a woman in Montgomery. Actually, he had signed a notarized contract acknowledging his paternity of Bobbie Jett's as yet unborn child on October 15, 1952, three months before her birth. She was to be "wholly and completed supported by him."

He was a lanky, boyish-looking man (not good looking) with eyes much older than his years. Drugs, liquor, and hard-living caught up with him on New Year's Eve, 1952, in Knoxville, Tennessee, at the Andrew Johnson Hotel -- six days before Jett was born. Bobbie Jett moved from Montgomery to California after the birth, and Hank's mother adopted her only to die and leave the child unprotected. She was with a foster home, as a ward of the state, then adopted again at the age of three when she went to live in Mobile, Alabama.

On her 21st birthday, her mother visited her where she was attending the University of Alabama and presented her with two thousand dollars her grandmother had bequeathed to her to receive at that time. So the truth is out. She did have a famous father from whom she had inherited his talent. "My guitar was my best friend growing up," she said; the radio was mine, and I sang along with the pop songs and could mimic them perfectly, and pantomime difficult recordings such as Teresa Brewer who always sang in a hurry. My dad used to sing the Hank Williams' songs, 'Hey, Good Lookin' and "I'm so lonesome I could cry' along with 'Beautiful, beautiful brown eyes' to me as he played his guitar. His father sang church music and played harmonica. I did try 'Your Cheatin' Heart' on the Cas Walker Show once, but I was not country enough to suit his high standards and went back to the love of my life, pop music.

She'd wondered where she had gotten her deep love of music, but now knew and also realized that "Hard to believe I'd been so wanted after all." She discovered that her mother had married and had five other children but, when Jett called to speak with her on the phone, she leared that her mother was dead, too. So, now she is an orphan. Just knowing she was loved after all was the lifting of a tremendous burden.

You must see the photo sections in the book to realize just how far this woman has come. Her biological mother was beautiful, could have been my sister, dark eyes and all. There is a photo of Hank and Aubrey (Hank, Jr.'s mother) with a group called 'The Drifting Cowboys." Jett made a tour in 1989 with this same group (old men now) and it was called "Jett Williams and the Drifting Cowboys." Life comes full circle. There is an article in August, 2005, edition of 'Guideposts,' an inspirational publication called "Birthright" about her present life in Hartsdale, Tennessee. She looks like her dad.

Jett Williams' story is the sort of tale for soap opera fodder, only better, because it's based on true life. This book has everything...fame, sex, sabotage, covertness, secrets, lies, legal battles...and all within the same family. It's sad to know that the family of such an inspiring talent as Hank Williams, Sr., could stoop to such cruelty and greed...and even more amazing that Jett was able to rise above it all, claim her heritage and be recognized for her own talent. She should be a spokesperson for open adoption records everywhere! Her struggle is an inspiration to adoptees everywhere who hope for a biological reconnection.

I just happened to find the book once before in a discount bookstore. The story interested me, and so I picked up the book. What a story this girl has to tell. I recently saw a play on the life of Hank Williams, and decided I needed to read it again. It's an amazing story about this girl who was adopted, and did not learn her true identity until almost 30 years later.

It's also an amazing story of all the hurdles that she had to go through to PROVE that she was Hank's daughter. She is a fighter, that girl.

[...]

A great book.

I realy enjoyed this book liked that it is writen in first person if you like people finding
family. I was glad to put this book on the book shelf .

I am stuck in a vacation cabin and it is raining and there isn't much around here to read, so I read this book. On the one hand, the story is kind of interesting. It is amazing the depths humans will sink to when there is money involved. On the other hand, the author is a whiny narcissist who blames everybody else for her problems.

For example, her mother ruined her wedding and her best friend wasn't invited until the last minute, and then didn't speak to her for seven years. What kind of a person allows that to happen?

Later, she goes to an awful lot of trouble to track down her half-siblings in California. Then she shows up at the meeting liquored up, and gets in a fist-fight with her older sister who she just met. Nice. Real class act.

She describes how she meets a lawyer who asks her if she can sing and play the guitar, and then piles on lavish praise at her obvious talent. Right. If she has so much talent, why didn't she pursue music when she was young? Why didn't she do anything notable when she was young, other than be a victim?

Her birth father had a difficult and painful childhood, and yet he rose to greatness. She had a few bumps in her life, as everybody does, and rose to mediocrity.

So this book is all about "Look at me, poor little me, everybody picked on me, look how great I am, look how talented I am, look how I'm beautiful like my birth mother, look how much money I got."

By the end of the book, we are supposed to be happy she got all that money and fame, and recognition, and a singing career. All because of an accident of birth. How special for her.