The Johnson Family Singers

The group consisted of father Jesse ("Pa"), mother Lydia ("Ma"), and four children: Kenneth (Red), Betty, and twins Bob and Jim.[1] The family lived in an apartment in Greensboro, North Carolina, and struggled to survive during the Great Depression. Jesse worked as a house painter and mill worker.

In the fall of 1937 Jesse returned from the Stamps-Baxter Music School in Dallas, Texas, where he was inspired by the emerging Gospel music of the day.[2] He became a teacher of shape note music.[2] His first students were his children, at the time 10, 9, and 7 years old respectively.[1] They began to sing at family reunions and churches.[3]

In 1940 the family attended a singing convention at the Armory Auditorium in Charlotte, NC.[1] This led to 50,000-watt radio station WBT asking the family to sing on "Grady Cole's Sunday Morning Farm Club".[1][3] The family's signature song on the program was "There’s a Little Pine Log Cabin".[2] They would go on to sing on several CBS Radio Network programs.

In the late 1940s, the family recorded 52 songs for Columbia Records, under the direction of Art Satherley.[1] Later, a similar number of songs were recorded on the RCA-Victor label.[1] Their contract with Quaker Oats[3] ended their radio career in May 1951.

The family appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show appearances in 1958.[1] Over the next 40 years, Betty Johnson had a solo career of her own.

• Johnson, Kenneth M. (1997). The Johnson Family Singers: We Sang for Our Supper. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi. pp. 160. ISBN 1-57806-004-4.