Tim McGraw

Since his 1994 breakout album Not A Moment Too Soon, Tim McGraw has been one of country music's most popular performers. With his high-pitched, rather growly voice, McGraw became known for his ability to stir up a range of emotions with everything from jumping dance tunes to heartfelt ballads. Many of McGraw's albums and singles have topped the country music charts, leading him to achieve total album sales in excess of 40 million units. For his contribution to the recording industry, McGraw received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6901 Hollywood Blvd.

He was born Samuel Timothy McGraw in Delhi, Louisiana, a town in Richland Parish, to a waitress, Elizabeth "Betty" Ann (née D'Agostino), and Frank Edwin "Tug" McGraw Jr., who later became a relief pitcher for the New York Mets and the Philadelphia Phillies. McGraw is of Italian and Irish descent on his mother's side, and of Scots-Irish descent on his father's side. In 1966, Tug was a pitcher for the Jacksonville Suns, and he lived in an apartment above Betty D'Agostino, who attended Terry Parker High School. The pair had a relationship, and when Betty became pregnant, her parents sent her to Louisiana to live with relatives and to have the baby.

Reared by his mother in Start, also in Richland Parish, east of Monroe, McGraw grew up believing his stepfather, Horace Smith, was his birth father. From the time of his mother's marriage until the time he met his biological father, his last name was Smith. At age 11, McGraw discovered his birth certificate while searching his mother's closet to find pictures for a school project. After his discovery, his mother revealed that his biological father was Tug McGraw, and took Tim to meet him for the first time. For seven years, Tug denied being Tim's father. Tim was 18 years old when Tug first realized how much Tim looked like him at that age, and he acknowledged paternity. Shortly after that he changed his surname to match that of his biological father, though he continues to consider his stepfather, Smith, as his true dad.

Tug paid for his college tuition at Northeast Louisiana State University where Tim took pre-law courses after seeing the film And Justice for All, starring Al Pacino. But he ended up enjoying parties more than classes, and became more interested in music. He ended up buying a guitar at a pawn shop, and within a year, he was singing in clubs around Monroe, Louisiana. Soon, he decided to quit school and try his luck in Nashville. His father told him to finish school first, but McGraw reminded him that he had quit college for baseball. Besides, as McGraw noted to Dave McKenna in the Washington Post, "The only thing I learned in college was how to float a keg, and I didn't figure that was going to get me too far. So even though it was kind of scary, I wasn't giving up much. I thought I could make it." His dad continued to support him while he tried to rev up a career. The two remained close until Tug's death in 2004.

McGraw came to the attention of Curb Records in 1990. After cutting a demo single, McGraw gave a copy to his father, Tug McGraw. A man who was friends with Curb Records executives heard the demo while driving with Tug McGraw one day and recommended that Curb contact the young singer. Several weeks later, he was able to play his tape for Curb executives, after which they signed him to a recording contract. Two years later, in 1992, he had his first minor hit with "Welcome to the Club" off his self-titled debut album. Although the album failed to make much of a dent on the charts, McGraw did have two other minor hits from it in 1993: "Memory Lane" and "Two Steppin Mind."

In February of 1994, McGraw released the infectious single "Indian Outlaw," and it quickly raced up the country charts and became a radio hit. However, it also earned him unwanted status as a novelty act, and attracted a bitter backlash from many who found it offensive to Native Americans. The lyrics included lines like "I'm an Indian outlaw / Half- Cherokee, half-Choctaw / My baby she's a Chippewa," and lines like "You can find me in my wigwam / I'll be beatin' on my tom-tom." But McGraw stated he meant no harm, and simply used the tribal names and other words for their rhyming qualities. In addition, the outcry surprised him since he had been closing his stage show with the tune for four years. However, Cherokee Nation leader Wilma Mankiller sent a letter to stations claiming the song exhibited "crass exploitative commercialism at the expense of Indians," and expressed that it "promotes bigotry," according to a Billboard article by Peter Cronin. As a result, some radio stations in Arizona, Nevada, Oklahoma, and Minnesota started refusing to play it. On the other hand, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians based in North Carolina wrote to McGraw's management company in support of the song.

Shortly after this brouhaha, McGraw's second album was released. Not a Moment Too Soon became the number one country hit in its first week on the charts. Also, three more singles off the effort topped the charts in addition to "Indian Outlaw." The album and the number one single "Don't Take the Girl," a melodramatic ballad, racked up awards from the likes of the Academy of Country Music and Country Music Television. McGraw was also named best new country artist by Billboard and others. Not a Moment Too Soon hugged the top spot on the country album chart for 26 consecutive weeks and sold about eight million copies over the next few years. Immediately, McGraw was catapulted from playing honky-tonks to embarking on a major headlining tour.

The next year, in September of 1995, McGraw released All I Want. Though it was an attempt to show more serious musicianship, the first single released was the jaunty "I Like It, I Love It." As he explained to Deborah Evans Price in Billboard, "It was a cool, fun, back- to-school song. It doesn't really say a lot. We put it out because it's a fun sing-along song, and it will call attention to some of the meat songs on the album that I really want people to hear." The song stayed at number one for five weeks and the album sold three million copies, but McGraw was largely passed over at the 1996 awards ceremonies.

Still, 1996 saw the successful Spontaneous Combustion tour, which featured country singer Faith Hill as the opening act. By the end of the tour, McGraw's personal life was sizzling as well, and he asked Hill, who has a laundry list of country music awards herself, to marry him. They were on tour at the time in Montana, and he popped the question in his dressing room, which was housed in a trailer. He related to Jeremy Helligar and Lorna Grisby in People, "She said, 'I can't believe you're asking me to marry you in a trailer house,' and I said, 'Well, we're country singers, what do you expect?'" She later accepted the proposal by writing "yes" on the mirror in his trailer while he was on stage, and they married on October 6, 1996. Their daughter Gracie was born in 1997, and another daughter, Maggie, was born the following year.

In the meantime, McGraw began to diversify in order to have options in case his popularity bottomed out. He formed production and management companies, and he and Byron Gallimoer coproduced Joe Dee Messina's debut album, which contained the hit "Heads Carolina, Tails California." McGraw need not have worried. In June of 1997, he spawned another winner with Everywhere, which rose to the top of the charts and included three number-one singles, including "It's Your Love," which he sang with Hill. In addition, that song made the crossover to hit the top ten on the pop chart as well. Everywhere reflected a new stability in his life as a married man and father, and attracted the biggest onslaught of awards to that point. Among other honors, in 1997 "It's Your Love" was named Billboard magazine single of the year award, Radio & Records single of the year, and Country Music Television deemed him male artist of the year, in addition to bestowing upon McGraw video of the year and top video of all time awards. Also, in 1998 he won awards from the Academy of Country Music for single of the year, song of the year, video of the year, and top vocal event, all for "It's Your Love," as well as winning Billboard's country single of the year for "Just to See You Smile."

In 1999, McGraw's hot streak continued after the release of A Place in the Sun that May. It debuted at the top of Billboard's album chart and spawned a number one country chart hit, "Please Remember Me." The awards continued to pile up as McGraw won Academy of Country Music Awards for male vocalist of the year and vocal event of the year (with Faith Hill) for "Just to Hear You Say that You Love Me," and Country Music Association Awards for male vocalist of the year and album of the year as artist and producer, for A Place in the Sun, among others. In addition, for the second year in a row, a Radio & Records country radio readers poll award voted Everywhere the best album. He also collected several other nominations for A Place in the Sun from awards ceremonies to be held in 2000. To top it off, People magazine named him the "sexiest country star" that year in their annual issue devoted to dreamboats. Adding to his cache of honors, in 2000, McGraw won an Academy of Country Music Award for male vocalist of the year and his first Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals for "Let's Make Love," a duet he sang with his wife.

The accolades and hits keep coming for this country music superstar. Both Live Like You Were Dying (2004) and Let It Go (2007) hit the top of the country and pop album charts. "Live Like You Were Dying" netted McGraw his second Grammy Award in 2004 for Best Male Country Vocal Performance. The following year, he and his wife received their second shared Grammy for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals for "Like We Never Loved Before."

McGraw has also branched out into acting. He appeared in the 2004 feature film Black Cloud directed by Rick Schroder and the 2006 family drama Flicka. In a supporting role, McGraw also worked with Jamie Foxx and Jennifer Garner in 2007's The Kingdom.

McGraw lives in a six-bedroom home on 200 acres just outside of Nashville. As he explained to Zimmerman in USA Today, "It's the most relaxing place in the world. We have bonfires all the time on the Back Forty and hang out on tailgates and pick guitars and have a few beers." He and his wife are away on tour frequently, but Hill never leaves without the children. "I love my wife more than anything in the world," McGraw remarked in another People article. "But boy, when she had our babies, it quadrupled. There's just something about the connection."

Sources: Wikipedia, Answers, Biography

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https://www.progenealogists.com/individual/tim-mcgraw

https://ethnicelebs.com/tim-mcgraw

Birth Name: Samuel Timothy McGraw

Place of Birth: Delhi, Louisiana, U.S.

Date of Birth: May 1, 1967

Ethnicity: Italian (maternal grandfather), Irish, Scots-Irish/Northern Irish, Bohemian Czech, English, Scottish, distant German, Dutch, and French Huguenot, 1/256 Swiss-German

Tim McGraw is an American country music singer, songwriter, and actor. He is married to singer and actress Faith Hill, with whom he has three children.

His father, Frank Edwin “Tug” McGraw, Jr., was a baseball player who was a pitcher for the New York Mets and the Philadelphia Phillies; he was of Scots-Irish/Northern Irish/Irish, Bohemian [Czech], English, Scottish, German, Dutch, French Huguenot, and 1/128th Swiss-German, ancestry. His mother, Elizabeth Ann “Betty” (D’Agostino), has Italian and Irish ancestry. Tim was raised by his mother and stepfather, Horace Smith.

Tim’s paternal grandfather was Frank Edwin McGraw (the son of Andrew Henry McGraw and Ella May Nave). Frank was born in California. Andrew was the son of William McGraw, who was born in County Down, Ireland, and of Mary Ann Crofton, whose parents were Irish. Ella was the daughter of David Robert Nave and Amelia Chrisman.

Tim’s paternal grandmother was Mable Madeline/Madeleine McKenna (the daughter of Frank McKenna and Marie Suchanek). Mable was born in California. Frank was born in California, to a father from Kansas and a mother from Missouri. Tim’s great-grandmother Marie was an emigrant from Bohemia, of Czech ancestry, the daughter of Joseph Suchaner and Frantiska Jiroutek.

Tim’s maternal grandfather was John Joseph D’Agostino (the son of Daniel Agusta D’Agostino and Elizabeth Isabella DeSilverstri). John was born in Washington, D.C., to a father from Teramo, Abruzzo, Italy, and a mother from Rome, Lazio, Italy. Elizabeth was the daughter of Anthony DeSilverstri.

Tim’s maternal grandmother was Annie Catherine Welch (the daughter of Samuel Timothy Welch and Annie Pearl Temple). Tim’s grandmother Annie was born in Monroe, Ouachita Parish, Louisiana, to parents from Louisiana. She was of either entirely or partially Irish ancestry.

Sources: Genealogies of Tim McGraw – http://worldconnect.rootsweb.ancestry.com http://worldconnect.rootsweb.ancestry.com http://worldconnect.rootsweb.ancestry.com https://www.geni.com

Genealogy of Tim’s father (focusing on his own father’s side) – https://www.findagrave.com

Tim mentions some of his ancestry, on CNN – http://transcripts.cnn.com