Introduction

Biography

James was the son of Fen­dell Reu­ben Ha­gan and Sar­ah Strode. He ma­rried three times, to Lil­li­an Ger­trude Jor­don, El­la Be­die Ev­ans (1894), and Rub­ye M. Vance.

Hagan mar­ried El­la B. Ev­ans of Tomp­kins­ville, Ken­tuc­ky, in 1892, and had two child­ren with her. After her death, he mar­ried Ru­bye Vance of Pa­du­cah, Ken­tuc­ky, in 1907, and had three sons with her.

He came to Christ at age four­teen and joined a Bap­tist church. Af­ter hold­ing mem­ber­ship in the Bowl­ing Green and Ow­ens­bo­ro First Church­es for years, he spent his last days in the Sev­en Hills Church where he served as dea­con, Sun­day school teach­er, and choir di­rect­or.

Hagan was known as an out­stand­ing mu­si­cian, re­ceiv­ing his train­ing in Tomp­kins­ville; Bowl­ing Green Nor­mal; the Moo­dy Bi­ble Institute, Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois; and the Cin­cin­na­ti Col­lege of Mu­sic.

A teach­er all his life, his main work was in high schools in War­ren, Mon­roe, Met­calfe, Hart, and Dav­iess Coun­ties, Ken­tuc­ky. He was head or joint head of the Mon­roe Nor­mal for ma­ny years in Flip­pin, Ken­tuc­ky, with Pro­fes­sor T. C. Gil­li­an­wa­ters. Al­to­geth­er he taught for for­ty years.

Hagan was as­so­ci­at­ed with such au­thors as Bliss, Steb­bins, Ro­de­hea­ver, Robert Cole­man, An­tho­ny Sho­wal­ter, the Vaugh­an broth­ers, and oth­ers. For about five years he trav­eled with a male quar­tet.

Works

His first mu­sic­al com­po­si­tion was writ­ten at age six­teen, and ov­er 800 of his hymns were pub­lished.

He al­so ed­it­ed two pu­blic school song books, and was ve­ry ac­tive in put­ting mu­sic in­to the pub­lic schools.