WHO IS OKEFENOKEE JOE?

     Recently dubbed as a “Living Georgia Icon” in a book entitled ‘Georgia Icons’, written by Don Rhodes of the Augusta Chronicle, OKEFENOKEE JOE’S professional musical career began under his given name of DICK FLOOD, shortly after leaving the US army in the mid 50’s, when he and army buddy, Billly Graves, teamed up forming a duet, calling themselves ‘The Country Lads’, and became regulars on the Jimmy Dean CBS TV Morning Country Music Show, out of Washington DC.  They recorded for Columbia Records.         

     Through the 60’s he was a successful Nashville based singer/songwriter, named in the Nashville Country Music Hall of Fame as the writer of the Wilburn Brother’s signature song, which was voted 1962’s Number One Country Song of the Year, “Trouble’s Back in Town”.  His songs were being recorded by great acts, including Roy Orbison, George Hamilton IV, Porter Wagoner, Billy Grammer, Anita Bryant, and others.  With several chart recordings of his own on Monument, Epic, and Kapp Records, and as a frequent guest on  Grand Ole Opry, he and his band, The Pathfinders, toured all over the world with many Country Music stars, often fronting for the show, and backing up the headliners.

     In the early 70’s, urged by a deeper calling, Dick Flood left Nashville, “disappeared” into the Great Okefenokee Swamp in Southeastern Georgia, and began a new life, re-inventing himself as ‘Okefenokee Joe’, writing new songs with new meaning, and performing his “Earth Day every Day” presentation in the schools of the South.   He had not retired from the Music Business.  He had just moved on.

     In the late 80’s, he narrated, and hosted several wildlife

Documentaries for Georgia Public Television, one of which entitled “Swampwise” won an Emmy Award in 1990.  His documentaries are  aired frequently throughout the year on GPB, always receiving high ratings, remaining the most requested shows GPB has ever produced, and turning Okefenokee Joe into a legendary folk hero in the South.      

     Today he appears all through the Southeast with his songs, stories and reptiles, at Fairs, Native American Functions, Outdoor Sportsman’s Shows, Schools etc.  He is still not retired.