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Charlie Louvin

American country music singer and songwriter (1927–2011)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionDec 6, 2025
Entity authorityQ3296979 ↗
Source-derived summary

Charles Elzer Loudermilk (July 7, 1927 – January 26, 2011), known professionally as Charlie Louvin, was an American country music singer and songwriter. He is best known as one of the Louvin Brothers, and was a member of the Grand Ole Opry since 1955.

Biography

Born in Section, Alabama, Louvin was one of seven children and grew up working on the family farm in nearby Henagar. He started singing when he was eight years old.

Louvin began singing professionally with his brother Ira as a teenager on local radio programs in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The boys sang traditional and gospel music in the harmony style they had learned while performing in their church's choir.

After Charlie left the act briefly in 1945 to serve in the Army Air Forces during World War II, the brothers moved first to Knoxville and later to Memphis, working as postal clerks by day, while making appearances in the evening. Another brief disbandment due to Charlie's service in the Korean War led to the brothers' relocation to Birmingham, Alabama.

Primarily known as gospel artists, the Louvins were convinced by a sponsor, "you can't sell tobacco with gospel music," and began adding secular music to their repertoire. They began making appearances on the famed Grand Ole Opry during the 1950s, becoming official members in 1955.

Editorial summary

“Charlie Louvin” enters the record as american country music singer and songwriter (1927–2011). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Charlie, Louvin and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1927, 2011, 1955, 1945—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1927-07-07. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Charlie, Louvin and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Charlie Louvin” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Charlie, Louvin and American provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 6, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q3296979. VIAF identifies the subject as 22334325. The Library of Congress control number is n88660280. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1927, 2011, 1955 and 1945.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Charlie Louvin”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Charlie Louvin primary sources, Charlie Louvin archive and Charlie research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Charlie Louvin”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Charlie Louvin” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.