Eddy Arnold Birthplace — Henderson, Tennessee

Richard Edward Arnold — known as Eddy Arnold, the Tennessee Plowboy — was born on May 15, 1918, near Henderson, in Chester County, Tennessee, to a sharecropping family. He began playing guitar at a young age, was performing on local radio by his teens, and joined Pee Wee King's Golden West Cowboys in 1940 before signing with RCA Victor and launching a solo career that would make him one of the best-selling country artists in history. He placed 147 songs on the Billboard country charts — more than any other artist — with 28 of them reaching number one.

Arnold was a key figure in developing the smooth, pop-inflected country sound that preceded the Nashville Sound proper. His warm, relaxed baritone and elegant phrasing made him equally at home on country radio and mainstream variety television, and he became one of the first country stars to successfully crossover to mainstream pop audiences. "Make the World Go Away," "What's He Doing in My World," and "Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye" are among his most enduring recordings. His career spanned six decades without a significant interruption.

Henderson and Chester County recognise Arnold as a local hero. He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1966 — one of the earliest inductees — and received the National Medal of Arts in 2003. Arnold died in Nashville on May 8, 2008, at the age of 89, outlasting nearly every other figure from country music's golden age.