Johnny Cash: Life in pictures

Johnny Cash grew up in Arkansas as J.R. Cash. He worked on the family farm through the Great Depression, joined the Air Force and got married before pursuing a professional career in music. His hobby of singing and songwriting became a job in 1955, when he signed with Sun Records. Above, Cash is pictured, center, in his senior high school photo. (Tim Rand / Associated Press)

Oct. 11, 2013 1:19 PM PT

Johnny Cash’s story is one of unbridled success, turbulent lows and redemption. We look back at the life of one of America’s most influential musicians of the 20th century.

By Andrea Wang / Los Angeles Times

In this 1962 colorized photo, Cash chats with his manager, Saul Holiff. Throughout the early ‘60s, Cash began to drink heavily and grew addicted to the amphetamines he took to stay awake during concerts. During this time Cash toured with the Carter family, eventually falling in love with June Carter, his second-wife-to-be. (From the Saul Holiff Collection / New Chapter Productions, Inc.)

Cash was the youngest musician to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1980, but his career reached its lowest point during this time — a decade of unnoticed albums marred by double bypass surgery and relapse into drug addiction. Cash was also dropped from Columbia Records. His career was revitalized in 1990 when he crossed genres and found an audience outside of country, teaming up with bands like U2 and punk quintet One Bad Pig. This 1990 file photo shows Cash onstage in Chicago. Two years later, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. (Con Keyes / Los Angeles Times)

Cash was eventually diagnosed with dysautonomia, a disease of the autonomic nervous system. His last albums, “American III: Solitary Man” (2000) and “American IV: The Man Comes Around” (2002) reflect on the effects of his illness. (Ron Edmonds / Associated Press)