The Ballad Of Grover Sow

Three KONO disc jockeys wrote, and along with a KONO news reporter, recorded a song about a pig. Here is how it happened.

About December 1958 a story appeared on the wire services about a pig named Grover who lived in England. Grover especially enjoyed eating slop that had been in the trough long enough to produce alcohol. Despite her masculine name, Grover was a sow.

One day, Grover discovered a gold mine…err…wine cellar. Depending on the source, Grover either broke into the wine cellar because of a leaking wine barrel or an exploding wine bottle. Suddenly Grover was in hog heaven as a wine connoisseur glutton.

After imbibing an abundant amount of wine, Grover was so high that she staggered around until she fell into a well in the barnyard where she lived in Rottingdean, Sussex. This triggered a gigantic rescue operation, which also triggered a huge media blitz.

The frequency of the Grover rescue stories on KONO newscasts attracted the attention of DJs Doug China, Jerry Miller, and Herb Carl. They began making comments about Grover regularly during their shows. As a result, Grover became somewhat of a San Antonio celebrity.

Doug, Jerry and Herb decided to take things one step further. They collaborated on lyrics to a song they called "The Ballad of Grover Sow." “Tom Dooley,” which was riding high on the record charts at the time, was used for the tune.

Doug, Jerry and Herb recorded “The Ballad of Grover Sow” as The Rottingdean Trio…a take-off on The Kingston Trio. Since I played the guitar on the recording, I got credit as The Tom Ellis Orchestra.

"The Ballad of Grover Sow" never made it to the top of the national record charts, but it sure got a lot of airplay on KONO. The response was big enough that a 45 RPM record was produced and made available to the general public for a $1 charitable donation.

Tom Ellis

Click here to listen to an audio excerpt of “The Ballad of Grover Sow.”

Click here to listen to a pristine audio excerpt from the flip side of “The Ballad of Grover Sow.”

Special thanks goes to Herb Carl, who not only provided additional story details, but also the audio excerpts.

Editors Note: It seems that Grover had another Texas Radio connection. According to Wally Guenther of The Los Angeles Times, in early 1959, a 90-pound tombstone was erected in Rottingdean, as a result of donations by “listeners of a Texas disc jockey who conducted a campaign to immortalize…Grover.“

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