Quiz

Buck had recorded his own version of "Streets of Bakersfield" in 1972. That album cut became a major No. 1 hit as a duet with Dwight Yoakam in the summer of 1988.

Got his nickname "Buck" at age three from a favorite horse.

He had throat cancer in 1993, and lost part of his tongue.

Inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1996. Dwight Yoakam gave his induction speech.

Mentioned in the Creedence Clearwater Revival hit "Lookin' Out My Back Door."

Buck has three sons named Buddy, Michael and Johnny.

Over a 25-year span, had 21 No. 1 hits on Billboard magazine's country singles chart. The biggest of those, 1963's "Love's Gonna Live Here," spent 16 weeks at No. 1 and was the last to stay atop the charts as long. That song's reign was interrupted once -- in October when Ernest Ashworth's "Talk Back Tremblin' Lips" took over for one week.

Ex-wife 'Bonnie Owens' died shortly after Buck of complications from Alzheimer's disease. They remained friends after their divorce.

His band was called "The Buckaroos".

He was awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Recording at 6667 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California.

He was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1996.

Father of Buddy Alan.

Opened the Crystal Palace restuarant and perfomance hall in his adopted hometown of Bakersfield, California.

Left Hee Haw (1969) in 1986 because he felt the show ruined his credibility as a musician and he was no longer taken seriously in the music industry. Spent the next few years re-building his credibility.

Members of the Buckaroos: Don Rich (guitar), Doyle Holly (bass), Tom Brumley (steel guitar) and Willie Cantu (drums). The Buckaroos also had several of their own albums.

Born at 5:00am-CDT

Was in a long-term relationship with Lisa Todd but they never married.

In the biography About Buck., Rich Kienzle writes: "'Buck' was a donkey on the Owens farm." "When Alvis Jr. was three or four years old, he walked into the house and announced that his name also was "Buck." That was fine with the family, and the boy's name became "Buck" from then on.".

Owens also collaborated with Cledus T. Judd on the song "The First Redneck On The Internet" in 1998, in which Owens also appears in the music video.

Using the pseudonym "Corky Jones" to prevent the recording of a rock 'n' roll tune from hurting his aspiring Country Music career, Owens recorded a rockabilly record called "Hot Dog" for the Pep label.

In the 1970s he had a relationship with Hee Haw "Honey" Lisa Todd and appeared with her as "Buck Owens and his gal Lisa" on the TV game show Tattletales.

Before the 1960s ended, Owens and manager Jack McFadden began to concentrate on Owens' financial future. He bought several radio stations, including KNIX (AM) (later KCWW) and KNIX-FM in Phoenix and KUZZ-FM in Bakersfield. During the 1990s, Owens was co-owner of the country music network Real Country, of which, the Owens-owned station KCWW was the flagship station. In 1998, Owens sold KCWW to ABC/Disney for $8,850,000 and sold KNIX-FM to Clear Channel Communications, but he maintained ownership of KUZZ until his death. Owens established Buck Owens Enterprises and produced records by several artists. He recorded for Warner Bros. Records, but by the 1980s he was no longer recording, instead devoting his time to overseeing his business empire from Bakersfield.

Country artist Dwight Yoakam was largely influenced by Owens' style of music and teamed up with him for a duet of "Streets of Bakersfield" in 1988. It was Owens' first No. 1 single in 16 years. In an interview, Yoakam described the first time he met with Owens: We sat there that day in 1987 and talked about my music to that point, my short career, and what I'd been doing and how he'd been watching me. I was really flattered and thrilled to know that this legend had been keeping an eye on me.

Owens' family moved to Mesa, Arizona, in 1937 during the Dust Bowl and Great Depression. While attending school in Arizona, Owens found that while he disliked formal schoolwork, he could often satisfy class requirements by singing or performing in school plays. As a result, he began to take part in such activities whenever he could.

From 1969 to 1986, Owens co-hosted the popular CBS television variety show Hee Haw with Roy Clark (syndicated beginning in 1971).

Following the death of Do Rich, Owens' latter trademark became a red, white and blue acoustic guitar, along with a 1974 Pontiac convertible "Nudiemobile", adorned with pistols and silver dollars. A similar car, created by Nudie Cohn for Elvis Presley and later won by Owens in a bet, is now enshrined behind the bar at Owens' Crystal Palace Nightclub in Bakersfield.

The stretch of US Highway 82 in Sherman, Texas, is named the Buck Owens Freeway in his honor.

According to Owens' son Buddy Alan, the accidental 1974 death of Don Rich, his closest friend, devastated him for years and impacted his creative efforts until he mounted a comeback in the late 1980s.

Long before Owens became the famous co-host of Hee Haw, his band became known for their signature Bakersfield sound, later emulated by artists such as Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakam, and Brad Paisley. Buck inspired indie country songwriter and friend Terry Fraley, whose band "The Nudie Cowboys" possessed a similar sound. This sound was originally made possible with two trademark silver-sparkle Fender Telecaster guitars, often played simultaneously by Owens and longtime lead guitarist Don Rich.

Owens successfully recovered from oral cancer in the early 1990s, but had additional health problems near the end of the 1990s and the early 2000s, including pneumonia and a minor stroke in 2004. These health problems had forced him to curtail his regular weekly performances with the Buckaroos at his Crystal Palace. Owens died in his sleep of an apparent heart attack at his ranch just north of Bakersfield on March 25, 2006, only hours after performing at his club.

In November 2013, Buck Owens' posthumous autobiography Buck 'Em! The Autobiography of Buck Owens by Buck Owens with Randy Poe was released. The book has a foreword by Brad Paisley and a preface by Dwight Yoakam.

Owens was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1996. He was ranked No. 12 in CMT's 40 Greatest Men of Country Music in 2003. In addition, CMT also ranked the Buckaroos No. 2 in the network's 20 Greatest Bands in 2005. He was also inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.

On July 17, 1974, Owens's best friend, the Buckaroos' guitarist Don Rich, was killed when he lost control of his motorcycle and struck a guard rail on Highway 1 in Morro Bay, where he was to have joined his family for vacation. Owens was devastated. "He was like a brother, a son and a best friend," he said in the late 1990s. "Something I never said before, maybe I couldn't, but I think my music life ended when he died. Oh yeah, I carried on and I existed, but the real joy and love, the real lightning and thunder is gone forever." Owens would never fully recover from the tragedy, either emotionally or professionally.

Owens is a member of both the Country Music Hall of Fame and Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.

In Buck Owens: The Biography (2010) investigative journalist Eileen Sisk offers a critical account of Owens and the shortcomings in his private life.