Lynn got the bug for performing at a young age, and her musical interests were helped by her parents who were aspiring songwriters themselves. Lynn’s other passion was horse riding, which she soon became a champion of. Once she was an adult, she would spend a lot of her time riding in equestrian competitions. And then when she would watch her daughter ride, Lynn would also spend that time writing songs. One of her songs made it to Merle Haggard, who recorded it in 1964. This convinced her to travel to Nashville, where she would be offered a recording contract of her own. She got her first big hit in 1967, and became one of country music’s biggest performers throughout the 1970’s. In 1970, Lynn recorded what would be her signature hit, entitled “Rose Garden”. It was a huge country-pop crossover song, even becoming a hit in almost 20 countries. The song itself went platinum, became a country music standard, and began the 70’s trend of having big country-pop crossover songs. It is now thought of as one of country music’s greatest songs ever. It also helped the album it was on become the biggest selling female country album for 27 years. After that, Lynn would continue a streak of hits for the rest of the 70’s and into the early 1980’s. Once radio moved onto other artists, Lynn was one of country music’s biggest female artist successes ever. She had 5 Grammy nominations, 7 ACM award nominations, 7 CMA award nominations, and certainly deserves a spot in the Country Music Hall Of Fame soon.

Crystal got her musical inspiration very early in life, since she is one of the many younger siblings of the legendary Loretta Lynn. She began her singing career in the 1960’s as a background singer in Loretta’s band, and even got to replace her sister for one performance at the Grand Ole Opry when Loretta got sick. Once Crystal graduated high school in 1970, she was signed to Decca records, the label her sister was on. Crystal had some small success on the label by sounding very similar to Loretta, but not enough success to make a dent. Wanting to try something new, she signed a new contract and went off in a different musical direction. This decision allowed her to become one of the most successful country-pop crossover artists in history. In 1977, Crystal released what would become her signature song “Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue”. It became a worldwide smash single, it won Crystal a Grammy award, it helped it’s album go platinum and was recognized as one of the top ten most played songs of the 20^th century. After success like that, Crystal continued to have hits until the late 1980’s. Once her radio career wrapped up, Crystal had been having hits for over a decade, she was nominated for 11 Grammy awards, and is one of the most successful female artists in the history of country music.

Like various other artists on this list, Linda was known for recording in multiple different genres and multiple different styles across her prolific career. But she did so much within the country genre that she would be very deserving to get an induction in the Country Music Hall Of Fame. Growing up in Tucson where her parents surrounded her with a variety of music sounds in their house, she moved to Los Angeles in 1964 with two of her friends. The three of them created a folk-rock band called The Stone Poneys which was signed to Capitol Records.  After their trio broke up, she released her first solo album, which has been called the first alt-country album by a female recording artist. Even though she was firmly in the L.A. folk-rock scene, touring with acts like Neil Young and The Doors, it still took a couple of years before she began getting a string of hits. In 1974, she released what is considered to be a masterpiece album; “Heart Like A Wheel”. She got a couple pop hits and a couple country hits off of it. From there, she would firmly stay in the pop realm for more than a decade. On the country side, she would get a handful of more hit songs, especially when she teamed up with Emmylou Harris and Dolly Parton (two legendary ladies already in the Country Music Hall Of Fame) in the 1980’s to create “Trio”, a super-group of talent. Add these accomplishments on top of the millions of records she was selling, the country music scene that she was opening to a mainstream audience, and the underappreciated songwriters that she was helping to showcase, and you begin to see why Linda Ronstadt deserves a spot in the Hall.

In the mid-1930s, Fred Maddox got tired of picking fruit in the migrant camps and gathered four of his six siblings together (brothers Cliff, Cal, and Don and 11-year-old sister Rose) to form a musical group. After Fred was able to get a radio spot for the group, they began traveling around California’s barns and festivals using the slogan “America’s Most Colorful Hillbilly Band”. The slogan referred to their high-energy shows and sometimes risqué lyrics. Their popularity was beginning to pick up in the California area when a majority of the band got drafted to fight in World War 2. Once the war was completed, the five siblings got back together and things continued to heat up. They made their first record label recordings in 1946. Using electric mandolin and stand-up bass, combined with their high energy performances means that they were possibly the originators of the rockabilly sub-genre. Rose Maddox is also considered the first woman to sing country boogie. Continuing their hot streak, they signed with Columbia records in 1951. They were also a big touring act at that point, hitting up locations like the Louisiana Hayride and the Grand Ole Opry. By 1956, Rose made the decision to go solo and the rest of the group slowly faded away. With them having helped originate a huge sub-genre in country music history on top of their many other accomplishments, it would be a celebrated moment if they were chosen to the Country Music Hall Of Fame.