From: Buddy McPeters
Date: October 16, 2003
Yup, that's the same Lee Ross 'The Hoss'. When I was a kid in the early 60's he DJ'd at AM radio station KPAS Banning, CA. My dad and I listened to his show every morning because he played LOTS of Bob Wills records on his program. He was pretty fond of playing his own tunes that he had wrote, particularly 'My Shoes Keep Walking Back To You' and 'Heart To Heart Talk' and he didn't mind telling the listening audience that he had not only wrote those songs but he had sang with Bob Wills. He was a firm believer in the old adage, "He who tooteth not his own horn, his own horn getteth not tooteth"! At least he wasn't like Tennessee Ernie Ford who DJ'd early on in his career on KFOX. I have heard acetate home recordings where ol' Ernie would cut right in on a record in the middle and say something like, "Now wasn't that great?! Let's here that part again!" while he fumbled around trying to reset the needle in the grooves to find the part that got him so excited. A friend of mine played rhythm guitar in Ernie's band in 1948 before he got big. Ernie bought radio time on KFOX for a 15 minute daily program. The band included Fiddlin' Bob White and Jimmy Bryant who played twin fiddles with White and doubled on guitar, and Laura Lee Owens McBride's sister Jane Owens who sang with them. Bryant hooked up with Speedy West and Capitol Records as did Tennessee Ernie. Jane was died in an automobile accident. White moved on to Oklahoma City where he joined Lucky Moeller at the Trianon Ballroom and daily broadcasts over KBYE and joined up with fledgling upstart fiddler Keith Coleman. Bob Wills left CA in 1949 after headquartering there since 1943 when he regrouped his Texas Playboys after his discharge from the Army. They settled in OK City taking White and Coleman from Moeller who was disbanding, leaving the Trianon and the KBYE spots open for Wills to fill which he did.