Music publisher William G. Hall helped start and promote the careers of dozens of musicians. Raised in Beaumont's Multimax Village, he graduated from South Park High School and Lamar State College, considered a career in law, and then turned to the growing Texas music scene. By 1956, he was managing George Jones. Soon after, he and his friend J.P. Richardson, known as "The Big Bopper," planned to build a recording studio and publishing company in Beaumont to promote Richardson's music, but a plane crash on Feb. 3, 1959, killed Richardson, Buddy Holly, and Richie Valens. Hall then opened a small studio called Hall-Way on Magnolia Street in 1959 and signed young musicians including Johnny Winter and the Jammers and Rod Bernard. He invited his old friend Jack Clement to move to Beaumont and become his business partner, and together they opened Gulf Coast Recording Company at 888 Pearl Street, along with Hall-Clement Publishing Co. and Jack and Bill Music Co. Within six months, Gulf Coast Recording produced the million-selling record "Patches" in May 1962. Hall and Clement continued recruiting songwriters, and Dickey Lee, Allen Reynolds, Bob McDill, Jerry Foster, and Bill Rice were eventually inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. Gulf Coast Recording Company recorded its last song in 1964, but Hall remained active in producing country music. He died in Beaumont in April 1983 and was buried at Forest Lawn Cemetery. In 1994, he was inducted into the Museum of the Gulf Coasts Music Hall of Fame, and in 2009 he was posthumously given the second-ever Frances Williams Preston Mentor Award.