Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles
available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. William Herbert
"Lum" York, (November 16, 1918 - August 15, 2004) was a musician best
known as the bass player in Hank Williams Drifting Cowboys from
1944-1949. After leaving the Drifting Cowboys, York played bass in Lefty
Frizzell's band until 1953. York continued to perform until weeks before
his death and was a fan favorite at the Hank Williams festival in
Georgiana, Alabama. In rural Alabama, the depression days of the 1930's
and early 1940s were rough. Lum York remembers "I only had two pairs of
overalls. My mother washed on Wednesdays so I had to wear them all week
long." Lum was born on November 16, 1918 as William Herbert York in the
tiny hamlet of Elmore, just about 15 miles north of Montgomery, Alabama.
Farming is a hard life at best. This was one of the worst times. Poverty
gripped the rural south with an iron fist. To eke out a meager living,
crops demanded grueling service. Lum was a schoolboy before they moved
to a house with electricity. But life was more than just the
backbreaking work of picking cotton and tilling the vegetable patch.
