Burl Ives

Burl Ives was an American singer and actor born in 1909 in Jasper County, Illinois, who built his reputation performing traditional folk songs after years of traveling the country as an itinerant musician. He hosted his own radio show, The Wayfaring Stranger, which helped bring folk music to a wider audience, and later crossed over into country music in the 1960s with considerable chart success. He was also a working film and stage actor throughout his career, making him one of the more broadly recognized entertainers of his era.