Jay Hickman was a comedian best known for his downhome humor and independently released, often-bawdy material.
Background
Hickman was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and was known as a "truck-stop" comedian, which denotes a genre of comedy that was meant to appeal to a Southern grass roots demographic and whose material was marketed mainly through truck stops.
Career
Despite his death in the early 1990s, his legacy of Southern-based material still enjoys a cult following. Career and fame lieutenant is from those venues that he created and enjoyed a cult, underground following of fans who mainly owned his self-produced cassette tapes of those strip club performances which were self-distributed by him prior to his record deal with Laughing Hyena Records, the same label which discovered comedian Jeff Foxworthy. A total of 7 CDs were released and are still available through the company"s web site.
Hickman also appeared on Home Box Office, Showtime, and The Playboy Channel.
Performed on the Hee Haw television show. Opened shows for comedians Jackie Gleason and Sammy Davis Junior.
And opened concerts for musical artists Tom Jones, Liza Minnelli, Tanya Tucker, Aretha Franklin, Mel Torme, Anita Baker, Lee Greenwood and George Jones. Death and legacy Hickman was diagnosed with liver disease in the 1980s and died at 37 in 1993.
He is buried at Southeastern Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
Then Tim Teal took over the reigns and carried on his legacy. Personal life Hickman was never married even though he claimed in his performances to have been married 4 times and engaged 11 times. Perhaps his most enduring story was called "Boat Ride", about a male character with a harelip who takes girls out on a boat ride in order to gain sexual favors ("put out or swim" or as Jay said it, "Put out, or thwim!"), a trick which ultimately turns against him.
Views
Quotations:
"put out or swim".