Joe Bonsall and his wife Mary loved cats. It’s apparent as soon as you enter their Hendersonville, Tennessee home. They also loved each other. That’s clear, too.
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“When he passed, I had such a hard time with it because it wasn’t just him gone; it was them,” said their daughter, Sabrina Carver.
Painted portraits of Joe and Mary’s precious pets and photos of the couple in love adorn most walls in their longtime lakefront house. While many walls are dedicated to family photos, Joe’s plaques that celebrate a near lifetime of success in the country music industry also hang in the house. A member of the Oak Ridge Boys since 1973, Joe was the famed voice on the vocal group’s signature song “Elvira.” Defining voices of a generation, the Oak Ridge Boys are members of the Grand Ole Opry and the Country Music Hall of Fame. They’re beloved for their infectious songs, distinct harmonies, welcoming smiles, and kind hearts.
Joe Bonsall retired from touring with the group in January of 2024 due to ALS, although he didn’t reveal the disease at the time. He died seven months later. Before passing, the singer readied his final book, I See Myself: Musings and Memories of a Blessed Life. He gave the project a final sign-off the week before he died, and Fidelis Publishing released the title in November.
Joe Bonsall Signed Off on His Book the Week Before he Died
Joe described the book, saying: “‘I See Myself’ is just a collection of visions as I have searched through my mental archives, and they have manifested themselves, reminding me of a life well lived. I have simply followed the leads and written stuff down.”
Mary wasn’t ready to talk about her husband or his book last fall, but she and Sabrina recently sat down with American Songwriter in their family home to chat about Joe and his last gift to them and his fans.
“I think it’s the threads and the crossroads, the common threads that run through,” said Sabrina of the book. She’s seated beside her mother, Mary, on their basement couch. A stuffed pillow emblazoned with a picture of one of Joe and Mary’s beloved cats leaned against the couch’s backrest. “He talked about how his parents met and how Pop just smiled and said, ‘Hello.’ And then, a couple of chapters later, he says something about when you looked at him and smiled, and he talked about his real-life dream girl. It’s just different threads that you can start to add things up even if you witnessed a lot of it.”
Sabrina said the book shows Joe at a crossroads and how his character helps guide him the right way—a plot personal and familiar to everyone.
Joe Bonsall’s Daughter Thinks Everyone Can Relate to His Book
Mary thinks readers will enjoy the sections about Joe’s early days in the Oak Ridge Boys and how he and baritone singer Richard Sterban were friends before Joe joined the group. Mary said Sterban visited Joe at work, and they talked about fashion. Then, the group’s William Lee Golden called Joe and asked if he wanted to join The Oak Ridge Boys. She said when Joe moved to Tennessee, he lived with fellow Oak Ridge Boy Duane Allen and his wife Nora Lee for about six months until he could get his own place.
She thinks chapter 48—the passage about 1998—might have been one of her husband’s favorites. Joe and Mary bought their beloved farm in 1998. Their grandson was born in 1998. He turned 50 that year, and their daughter, Jennifer, got married in 1998.
“It was quite a year,” Mary said.
The couple loved to travel and initially wanted to buy a home on an island or on the beach. When they discovered they couldn’t afford it, they started looking at property in Tennessee.
“We saw them horses running all through the fields, and it was just, ‘Oh my God, this is beautiful, but how will we take care of this?’” Mary said of falling in love with their farm. “And we thought about it and finally put a bid in, and we got it.”
Joe Bonsall and His Wife Sold Stock To Buy a Farm
Sabrina added that Joe and her mom had had a years-long competition over whose stocks were performing the best. Joe was proud of his Pepsi stock and sold it along with his Intel stock to pay for part of the farm.
He started writing the book in 2020, much of which they spent at the farm. Other parts of I See Myself include Joe’s childhood growing up in Philadelphia, his time as a veterinarian assistant, his relationship with God, his favorite Oak Ridge Boys memories, the progression of his ALS – and how much he loves his wife. That is Sabrina’s favorite part – chapter 14.
“I can live without singing,” he wrote. “I cannot live without my Mary.”
“It really just says it all,” Sabrina said. “Joe and Mary, legendary. “They were perfect for each other, and they were both such cards. When he passed, I had a hard time because it wasn’t just him gone, but it was them.”
Seated on the Haverty’s sofa, Mary said they’ve had for decades in front of huge windows overlooking Old Hickory Lake; she remembered the first signs of Joe’s ALS started when he was cutting down a limb that had fallen and bounced off the house.
Joe Bonsall Discovers ALS
“He was carrying the pieces into the front, and he noticed one of his legs was just a little off,” Mary explained, his motorized chair still within arm’s reach. “He said, ‘Mary, something’s wrong.’”
Then Joe slipped getting out of the shower. The family doctor told him he thought he hurt his back. She says it took him about two years to get a diagnosis.
Joe did everything he could to stay on stage and keep performing. Mary said that they had special braces made for his legs over time, and towards the end of his touring days, he sang from a stool. However, even the ALS couldn’t dampen his spirit. Joe kept singing, often stomping his foot and pumping his arm over his head.
Joe retired from touring in January of 2024. Mary said when he couldn’t sing anymore, he refocused on his book.
“He had written a few notes here and there down and kept them,” she said. “He had a few things to bounce off of, but that also kept him busy and his mind off of things, especially that last year.”
The singer kept his sense of humor all the way to the end of his life. His family positioned a hospital bed in the basement living room, which is surrounded by windows overlooking the lake. Joe had a really rough patch a couple of days before he died, and Mary called in their family and fellow Oak Ridge Boy Duane Allen to be by Joe’s side.
Joe Bonsall Kept His Sense of Humor Until the End
Sabrina remembers Joe had his eyes closed, and those closest to him were sitting around his bed in the living room.
“He wakes up and he’s like, ‘What’s going on?’” Sabrina said. “Jen is there, and she’s like, ‘Well, Daddy, you seemed like you were not having a good day. You haven’t been conscious.’ And he goes, ‘Is this the part where I go?’”
Sabrina knows Joe was praying for – and believing in – a miracle. And she was, too.
“God just said to me, he said, ‘Sabrina, you’re not going to get the miracle you want, but you’re going to see all kinds of miracles in between,’” she said. “And that’s what we saw. We saw his grace in so many situations. When Joseph retired, he got all the accolades and people reaching out and closure and getting to really kind of say goodbye without saying goodbye. He kept saying, ‘It’s like I’m dead, but I’m not dead because everybody was contacting him and talking to him.”
Mary still talks to Joe every day, and his motorized chairs are still where he left them. Mary noted that Barney, one of their cats, sleeps in the seat. She doesn’t need them anymore but admitted the only thing of her husband’s she’s been able to part with is his toothbrush. She doesn’t know if his spirit is still in the house, but she wanted to make sure that after all the suffering he endured, he could easily slip out.
Mary Wanted Doors Opened for the Angels
“I said, ‘Make sure you open the doors,’” she recalled her instructions if Joe died when she wasn’t in the room. “I didn’t want anything stopping his spirit from leaving. ‘If the angels want to guide him out of here, I want them to have an easy job of doing it.’”
Mary was used to spending time alone because he was gone so much on tour. She doesn’t know if she’s processed his death yet because sometimes it still feels like he’s just out playing shows with the Oaks.
“He’s gone, and he comes home,” she said. “I keep looking for that red truck to come down the driveway in the morning when I make coffee. I no longer look for that anymore, but I don’t know if I’m still in denial. I watched them out front load him in the hearse, and it just seemed so surreal.”
Mary picked out a midnight blue urn for Joe’s ashes, and she keeps it on a nightstand on his side of the bed. It’s dark blue and has two boxes – a place for each of their ashes – and a much smaller box in the middle for his favorite cat.
Joe wanted Barney, the cat who still sleeps in his chair, to always be with them.
(Photo by Jason Kempin/Getty Images)
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