Prior to his death, Haggard was hospitalized for 11 days at the Eisenhower Medical Center in Riverside, California, and canceled dates on his comeback tour with Willie Nelson. Performing was where he felt most at home: In 1986, Mr. Haggard told Patrick Carr of “Country Music Magazine”, “Probably the happiest moments of my life have been on a stage…The stage is a refuge for me, and it always has been”.
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He was subsequently pardoned by the then governor of California, Ronald Reagan, whom he later befriended.
Whether slow and introspective — “Going Where the Lonely Go”, “Back to Earth”, “If I Could Only Fly”, “Footlights” — or peppy and feisty — “Workin’ Man’s Blues”, “Big City”, the new “Working in Tennessee” and “Take Me Back To Tulsa” — Haggard handled every song effortlessly.
Haggard’s songs were the staple of honky-tonk juke boxes in the redneck south. They echoed the aspirations and struggles of the blue-collar worker.
The bleakness of recession-hit America was perfectly expressed in If We Make It Through December which provided Haggard with his only significant pop hit.
During a 2011 concert in Jackson, current country star Miranda Lambert called Haggard “one of my heroes” and performed his hit “The Way I Am” as part of her encore.
Opening with the raucous “Ramblin’ Fever”, the still strong-voiced Haggard segued perfectly into the barroom classic, “Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down”.
Haggard’s last Tucson show was at Fox Tucson Theatre in 2013.
“It’s what we used to refer to as ‘back home, ‘ ” he said. He filed for bankruptcy protection in 1992 after years of hard living, four divorces, gambling and bad investments.
“I’m the first to admit the English language is not my specialty”, Mr. Haggard wrote in the preface to his 1999 autobiography “My House of Memories”. By his mid-60s Haggard had settled down and spent his spare time fishing on his ranch in Northern California.
In 1993, Haggard married wife number five, Theresa, who was by his side until the end.
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When doctors found a spot on his lung in 2008, Haggard announced he didn’t plan to seek treatment. Their son Ben later joined him on the road, playing lead guitar in his father’s band.
