In 1939, Johnnie and Muriel teamed up with Jack Anglin (their future brother-in-law), as Johnnie Wright and the Happy Roving cowboys with Jack Anglin, later becoming Johnny and Jack and the Tennessee Hillbillies, then the Tennessee Mountain Boys. In 1943, Muriel first became known as Kitty Wells. Wright chose the name from an old song popularized on the Grand Ole Opry by the Pickard Family and the Vagabonds. Over these years, Kitty did not always sing on a regular basis with Wright, due to the fact that, by this time, she had two children, Ruby Wright and Bobby Wright, to look after, a second daughter, Carol Sue Wright followed. Wells made her first solo recordings for RCA-Victor in 1949, one song being “Gathering Flowers For The Master’s Bouquet”, now generally rated to be the first recording, on a major label, of a song that has become a country gospel standard. A futher session the next year failed to produce a hit and she left the lable. In 1951, she moved back to Nashville and with Johnnie and Jack becoming members of the Grand Ole Opry in January 1952, she decided to retire. However for the session fee, she had been persuaded by Johnnie and Paul Cohen of Decca Records to record a demo of a female answer song to Hank Thompson’s then current US country number 1, “The Wild Side Of Life”. On May 3, 1952, under the production of Owen Bradley, she recorded “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angles”. Two months later, unaware that it had been released, Kitty Wells found she had recorded a future million-seller. By August 8, it was beginning a six-week stay at number 1 on the country charts and had become a Top 30 pop hit. The publishers of “Wild Side Of Life” sued on the grounds that their song’s melody had been used. Since both songs had used the tune of the old song “ I’m Thinking Tonight Of My Blue Eyes” and “The Great Speckled Bird”, the case was thrown out of court. The song was the first woman’s song in country music and the recording made Kitty Wells country music’s first female singing star in her own right, giving her the distinction made Kitty Wells country music’s first female singing star in her own right, giving her the distinction of becoming the first female country singer to have a number 1 record (initially the Grand Ole Opry management felt the lyrics were unsuitable, but an intervention by the influential Roy Acuff, saw them relent). Inevitable, Kitty Wells’ retirement was shelved and by the end of the 50’s, she had registered 35 successive Top 20 country hits, 24 making the Top 10. There were further answer songs in “Pay For That Back Street Affair”, “Hey Joe” and “I’ll Always Be Your Fraulein’, and a less successful one called “My Cold Cold Heart Is Melted Now”. During this time, as one of several duet hits with Red Foley, “One By One” became a country number 1 in 1954. She also had Top 10 duets with Webb Pierce, including “Oh, So Many Years’ and “Finally”. She also recorded in 1959 with Roy Acuff.

In 1959, Decca signed her to a lifetime contract. During the 60’s, her list of chart hits extended to almost 70 and although only “Heartbreak USA” (1961) made number 1, there were 11 more that made the Top 10. Over the years she has won many awards, including being voted Billboard’s Female Country Artiste from 1953 to 1965, but her greatest award came in 1976, when she was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville.

There is little doubt that her successes opened the way for many subsequent female country music singers. In 1952 Kitty Wells was named the Queen Of Country Music by Fred Rose and in the opinions of country tradition-alists, she still holds her title with dignity and sincerity. She has, as country historian Bill C. Malone noted, “preserved an image of wholesomeness and domesticity that was far removed from the world she often sang about."