This is an IHeart podcast.

And we return to our American stories.

Up next, a story from a man who has sold more than 45 million records and has 38

top 40 hits to his name. We're talking about Pat Boone. When we interviewed Pat, the first

question we asked him was undeniably basic, but he answered it beautifully. We asked him how he

became famous. Let's get into this story.

Take it away, Pat. Well, I grew up in Nashville, Tennessee. I'm a country boy. My dad, a building

contractor, mom, a registered nurse, very practical professions. But we were, as so many people in

Middle Tennessee were and are, we were churchgoers,

we were church members, and I grew up believing and was baptized when I was barely 13.

So in my teens, I was thinking of myself, seeing myself as a Christian, a child of God,

and really living a good, wholesome life, and dating Shirley Foley, the daughter read Foley, the country music Hall of Fame.

He wasn't then, but he was hosting the Grand Ole Opry, having replaced Roy Aikoff after many years, and I was not a big country music fan until I met Shirley Foley. She came to our high school. Her mom was not well and so she had to be in the dorm at the Lipscomb and at 16 we met and really a romance began then that continues to this minute.

But we were just teenagers and then her mom died when Shirley was 16, 17.

Her mom was young but rheumatic fever and heart condition.

First open heart surgery ever in Nashville at Vanderbilt Hospital.

But she didn't live long after that.

So then her mom's death brought us even closer together.

And so when Red Foley was given the opportunity to go to Springfield, Missouri,

to start the Ozark Jubilee,

which would become the first and huge nationwide country music show on Saturday nights from Springfield, Missouri.

But he hadn't done it yet, and he was taking his three widowed daughters, including Shirley, to Springfield,

...