John Wayne

John Wayne passed away more than 20 years ago, and his spoken word recording was last available at that time. Even though America: Why I Love Her is long gone, the patriotic album with a title track paying homage to the matchless beauty and bounty of the U.S. was remembered by many of the nation's citizens, especially in the wake of the tragic terrorist attacks against the U.S. that took place on September 11, 2001. Radio stations dug out their copies and proudly aired the Duke's voice as he recited the poetry of fellow actor John Mitchum: "From Alaska's cold to the Everglades/From the Rio Grande to Maine/My heart cries out, my pulse runs fast/At the might of her domain." In the days and weeks following the attacks, it was easy to comprehend the appeal of a recording that hailed a Kansas sunset or an Arizona rain and other details unique to each state in the union. It would be just as easy to assume that in 1973, when the album was first released, and again six years later when Wayne died and it was reissued, that the recording held appeal only to die-hard patriots and fans of the actor -- not so. The poetry that was the foundation of America: Why I Love Her stood on its own merits and earned a Grammy nomination. In two weeks, the total number of copies sold topped 100,000, and Simon and Schuster published a companion book in 1977.

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