A 92-year-old woman has opened up about how her late father worked on his hands and knees as a paralyzed street vendor becoming the true story and inspiration behind a popular Christmas-time song by country singer Willie Nelson.
The emotional and sad ballad ‘Pretty Paper’ has pulled at the heartstrings of listeners for years with a lyric about holiday shoppers moving past a disabled street vendor selling ‘pretty paper, pretty ribbons’ for pennies while crawling ‘all alone on a sidewalk’ in downtown Fort worth, Texas.
The specific vendor Nelson sings about in the song was named Frankie Brierton, from Santo, Texas.
The father-of-one could be found outside of the now-closed Leonard’s Department Store in the area selling pencils and papers to anyone who would purchase them.
His daughter, 92-year-old Lillian Compte, explained to DailyMail.com how her father became disabled.
A 92-year-old woman has opened up about her late father, Frankie Brierton (above), being the true story and inspiration behind a popular Christmas-time song, ‘Pretty Paper’ by country singer Willie Nelson
The sad ballad by Nelson (left in 2017 and right in 1967) has pulled at the heartstrings of listeners for years with a lyric about holiday shoppers moving past a disabled street vendor selling ‘pretty paper, pretty ribbons’ for pennies
The song discussed how street vendor would sell the items while crawling ‘all alone on a sidewalk’ in downtown Fort worth, Texas outside of the now-closed Leonard’s Department Store (above in 1930)
Brierton’s daughter, 92-year-old Lillian Compte, explained to DailyMail.com how her father became disabled. She is pictured above on Christmas Eve holding up a photo of her father inside her Conroe, Texas home
‘Well he had spinal meningitis when he was a child and he was crippled from the neck down,’ she emotionally said.
‘His legs just turned up, you know under him and he crawled to get around.’
She explained that her father commuted everyday from his home alone and refused assistance from others.
‘He said he wasn’t going to give up and he’d get around the best he could and he did,’ she tearfully said.
‘He said, ‘I’d get around by myself I just don’t want any help’. He was very stubborn or very independent whatever you want to call it.’
She added that her father, who had seven wives, didn’t even want to use a wheelchair.
The 92-year-old woman said her father had spinal meningitis when he was a child and that left him ‘crippled from the neck down’. She is pictured above with her daughter Melanie (left) and son Rick (right) on Sunday
Of her father, she said: ‘His legs just turned up, you know under him and he crawled to get around.’ He is pictured above in the late 1940s near a truck next to his granddaughter
She added: ‘He said he wasn’t going to give up and he’d get around the best he could and he did,’ she tearfully said. ‘He said, ‘I’d get around by myself I just don’t want any help’. He was very stubborn or very independent whatever you want to call it.’
While selling the papers and pencils in the area, Brierton was well-known to those who shopped in the area, including Nelson who worked as a Southern Baptist Sunday school teacher and door-to-door vacuum salesman until he moved to Nashville, Tennessee in 1963.
In 1964, Nelson recorded ‘Pretty Paper’ and then released it a second time for his 1979 Christmas album with lyrics about Brierton that read: ‘Crowded streets — busy feet hustle by him
‘Downtown shoppers, Christmas is nigh
‘There he sits all alone on the sidewalk
‘Hoping that you won’t pass him by’.
But for many years, Compte did not know the song was about her father, who passed away aged 74 in 1973.
‘I think it’s beautiful. I thought it was sweet of Willie Nelson,’ she said after she found about it a few years ago.
When asked if she could recall if her father (above left as a child and right) knew about the song, Compte tearfully replied: ‘I think he did, I’m pretty sure he did, but who really knows – well he was very proud. He was a proud person, even though he was on his hands and knees. He tried to make a living.’
When asked if she could recall if her father knew about the song, Compte tearfully replied: ‘I think he did, I’m pretty sure he did, but who really knows – well he was very proud.
‘He was a proud person, even though he was on his hands and knees.
‘He tried to make a living.
‘He never wanted welfare or nothing. He said, ‘I’ll try to make a living one way or the other’, and he sold newspaper and pens to make a living and he did.’
Compte said she believes her father earned about $25-a-day selling the items to residents in the city.
‘I think he made pretty good on it because he had a lot of change when he got home,’ she said while crying.
‘I thought he was amazing too. He didn’t want a hand out.
‘He just set off to make a living the best way he could.’
Her son, Rick Compte, told DailyMail.com that he thought it was pretty cool of the country singer to write a song referencing his grandfather.
Of her father, the sweet 92-year-old woman also said: ‘I thought he was amazing too. He didn’t want a hand out. He just set off to make a living the best way he could.’
‘In different ways, it’s kind of cool that they were writing about my grandfather,’ he said.
‘He was always out there working, his handicap did not hinder his ability and he never went on welfare or anything.’
Nelson has often discussed how ‘Pretty Paper’ is based on trips to Leonards, which many have claimed to be the country’s first supercenter that covered four blocks in the middle of the downtown Fort Worth.
The elderly woman also said that besides working at Leonard’s, her father also sold papers and pencils in Dallas and Houston.