
Well, I had to ask Grok who John Rollins was.
I mean, I immediately just thought of Henry Rollins. 🤣
Grok said: “John W. Rollins Sr. (1916–2000) was an American entrepreneur who rose from poverty in Georgia to become a wealthy businessman, founding companies like Rollins Truck Leasing and Rollins Inc. A self-made millionaire, he befriended Johnny Cash, bonding over their humble roots. In the 1960s, Rollins bought Cinnamon Hill, a historic Jamaican estate, selling it to Cash in the early 1970s as a retreat. Cash owned it until 2003; Rollins’ widow Michele repurchased it in 2012. A philanthropist and Delaware’s Lieutenant Governor (1953–1957), Rollins left a legacy of success, generosity, and a unique friendship with Cash, cemented by their shared haven.”
Well, I didn’t even know I needed a house in Jamacia until now.
Although they were best friends, my father tended to defer to John Rollins in subtle ways in conversation, due to John’s greater age and vaster wealth and his ability to genially command the world around him to bend to his ideas and plans. I cannot think of another person, apart from his own father, to whom my father responded in that particular way. I adored John Rollins, who was a superb raconteur with a refined sense of irony, and truly a self-made man. As a boy, he had studied obituaries in the newspaper to find when a funeral was taking place so he could unobtrusively slip into the family wake and get a free meal. Although by 1976 he was one of the richest men in the country, he and my father would try to “out-poor” each other at the dinner table with stories of their childhoods of abject poverty.
– Rosanne Cash, Composed (Amazon)