Today’s Country Legend was born January 27, in Atlanta, Texas,

growing up sang in the local Methodist church choir and learned to play guitar.

has had eight songs that reached the number-one position.

was injured when walking a high school friend to the door of her hotel room at a Quality Inn in downtown Nashville. He was confronted by three men and was shot four times, allowing his friend to escape. Two of the wounds were major and necessitated surgery at Nashville’s Vanderbilt University Medical Center,] and one bullet remained embedded in his hip.

cites Merle Haggard, Keith Whitley, and George Strait as