Random Amazing True Stories About Johnny Cash's Crazy Life (18 items)

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  (#4) He Almost Made An Entire Species Extinct

  How many musical legends can say they nearly eradicated an entire species? Probably just Johnny Cash. Also, that's probably a good thing. In the 1960s, Cash parked his home-rigged “party truck” in a national forest in California, where it overheated and started a massive fire that scorched hundreds of acres.

  Tragically, the blaze took out 49 of the area's 53 endangered California condors. Cash responded that he didn’t "care about your damn yellow buzzards." 
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  (#10) June Carter Wrote 'Ring Of Fire' About Coveting Johnny Cash

  Like many musical legends, Johnny Cash didn’t write all of his own songs. In fact, one of his biggest hits, "Ring of Fire," was written by June Carter, his future wife. Carter wrote the song about Johnny Cash, more specifically the guilt she felt over her feelings for him despite their marriages to other people.

  She obviously got over it later! But seriously, it was an intense and torrid quagmire of passion and morality. 
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  (#13) Cash Wrote 'Chicken In Black' To Upset Record Execs

  Out of all the amazing songs in Johnny Cash’s discography, "Chicken In Black" is a bit of an outlier, though, there’s a good reason for it. Cash was annoyed with his record label, so he set out to make a song so terrible they would let him out of his contract.

  He even recorded a music video for it, which featured him in a powder-blue cape and yellow jumpsuit. The song was about a singer’s brain being put into a chicken, because why not? Cash’s plan worked, and he was let out of his contract.
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  (#6) Muhammad Ali Wrote Him A Poem

  Game recognizes game. A fantastic example of this is the interaction between Johnny Cash and the legendary boxer Muhammad Ali. Ali apparently wrote Cash a poem, which Cash treasured so much that he kept it locked in a fireproof safe thereafter.

  It eventually came to light that Ali hadn’t actually written the poem, but had lifted it from another author, which is actually more impressive if you think about it. Muhammad Ali, one of the most intimidating men to ever live, lied about writing a poem just to impress Johnny Cash.
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  (#7) He Began Smoking Before He Was A Teenager

  Cash began smoking at 12, and never looked back, picking up a lifelong nicotine habit. It’s a wonder that it didn’t ruin his amazing voice. 

  LIFE unseen reports that smoking was one of many "bad" habits Cash found himself getting into at a young age. Another of these habits was apparently eating cotton bolls while working in the fields. 
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  (#18) He Used A Windshield Wiper To Clear His Friend's Ashes From His Car

  Although his songs can bring out tears in even the manliest of men, Johnny Cash wasn’t exactly one for "emotions." Faron Young was a long-time friend of Cash’s, and a musical contemporary. When he died in 1996, his son asked if he could spread Young’s ashes in Johnny’s garden, which he had enjoyed visiting.

  Nature intervened, and the remains ended up all over Cash’s car windshield. When he returned home to find the mess, Cash unceremoniously windshield wiped his departed friend into oblivion, remarking that Young "went back and forth, back and forth, until he was all gone."

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