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NASHVILLE, Tenn. - June Carter Cash, the Grammy-winning scion of one of country music's pioneering families and the wife of country giant Johnny Cash, died Thursday (May 15, 2003) of complications from heart surgery. She was 73.
She died at a hospital with her husband of 35 years and family members at her bedside, manager Lou Robin said. She had been critically ill after May 7 surgery to replace a heart valve.
A singer, songwriter, musician, actor and author, June Carter Cash performed with her husband on record and on stage, doing songs like Jackson and If I Were a Carpenter, which won Grammy awards in 1967 and 1970, respectively. Their duets included It Ain't Me Babe in 1964 and If I Had a Hammer in 1972.
She was co-writer of her husband's 1963 hit Ring of Fire, which was about falling in love with Cash. In his 1997 autobiography, Johnny Cash described how his wife stuck with him through his years of amphetamine abuse.
"June said she knew me - knew the kernel of me, deep inside, beneath the drugs and deceit and despair and anger and selfishness, and knew my loneliness," he wrote.
June Carter was born June 23, 1929, in Maces Spring, Va. Her mother, Maybelle Carter, was in the Carter Family music act with her cousin Sara Carter and Sara's husband, A.P. Carter. In 1927, they made what are among the first country music recordings.
In the late 1950s, after her marriage to country singer Carl Smith broke up, June Carter moved to New York to study acting at the behest of director Elia Kazan, who had seen her perform while scouting Tennessee for movie locations.
In 1961, she turned down an offer to work on a variety show that had Woody Allen as one of the writers, agreeing instead to tour with Johnny Cash for $500 a week. They married in 1968 after he proposed to her on stage on London, Ontario.
In 1999, she released an acoustic album, Press On, that amounted to a musical autobiography and won her another Grammy.
June Carter Cash did occasional acting roles, including the part of Robert Duvall's mother in the 1997 film The Apostle. With her husband, she periodically performed at Billy Graham crusades.
Johnny and June Carter Cash had a son, John Carter Cash, in 1970. She was also the mother of country singer Carlene Carter, whose father was Smith, and singer Rosanne Cash is her stepdaughter.