Abilene

Abilene is a city in Taylor and Jones Counties in Texas, United States. Its population was 117,063 at the 2010 census, making it the 27th-most populous city in the state of Texas. It is the principal city of the Abilene metropolitan statistical area, which had an estimated population of 123,420, as of 2019. It is the county seat of Taylor County. Abilene is a song written by Bob Gibson, Lester Brown and John D. Loudermilk, and recorded by American country music artist George Hamilton IV. The song reached number one on the U.S. country music chart for four weeks, and peaked at number 15 on the pop music charts. George Hamilton IV performed “Abilene” in the 1963 movie Hootenanny Hoot. Bob Gibson was inspired to write the song after watching the 1946 Randolph Scott movie, “Abilene Town.” The setting for the movie was Abilene, Kansas, the rail-head town at the end of the Chisholm Trail.  A book titled “The Women There Don’t Treat You Mean: Abilene in Song,” written by Joe W. Specht, provides a different twist as to what town the song was written about.  Specht admits that there is still some uncertainty as to whether the song originally was written about Abilene, Texas, or Abilene, Kansas.   In any case, according to Specht, after performing the song before several thousand enthusiastic Texans at the Kerrville Folk Festival in 1978, Gibson claimed, “I knew right away I’d written it about Abilene, Texas!”