Eighty-five years ago today, the songwriter behind one of Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn's biggest hits was born in Kentucky.

A packed house at Scheels Arena helped create bigger sound when vocalist Randy Owen couldn't sing with much strength.

Lacking clout when he entered the music business, John Mellencamp acquiesced to his manager’s insistence that he change his name to the ostensibly more marketable Johnny Cougar. But after he began to ...