Timeline: How Cross Canadian Ragweed's members met, split up and reunited 15 years later

Yahoo

03-04-2025

The long-awaited April 10-13 reunion shows for Oklahoma Red Dirt band Cross Canadian Ragweed have evolved into what's believed to be the state's biggest concert event ever.
How did the band members meet, split up and reunite after a 15-year breakup? Here's a timeline of some major events in the evolution of the influential band, leading up to the sold-out "Boys from Oklahoma" concert run at Oklahoma State University's Boone Pickens Stadium in Stillwater.
1991: Still teenagers, frontman Cody Canada, drummer Randy Ragsdale, guitarist Grady Cross and bassist Matt Wiedemann play their first show at their hometown venue the 50 Yard Line Club in Yukon. They take the band name "Cross Canadian Ragweed" from pieces of each member's last name.
1994: Cross Canadian Ragweed officially forms in Yukon, with bassist Jeremy Plato replacing Wiedemann in the band's definitive lineup.
1994: After graduating from Yukon High School, the members of Cross Canadian Ragweed relocate to Stillwater, the birthplace of Red Dirt music.
1998: The band records and releases its first album, "Carney," on its own independent label, Underground Sounds.
More: 'Gives me chill bumps:' With Cross Canadian Ragweed's reunion, OSU hosts a historic event
1999: The group's first live album, "Live and Loud at the Wormy Dog Saloon," debuts, including Ragweed's cover of Gene Collier's song "Boys from Oklahoma."
2001: The studio album "Highway 377" debuts.
2002: Ragweed records and releases "Live and Loud at Billy Bob's Texas."
2002: Ragweed signs a major-label record deal with Universal South.
2002: The band releases its self-titled major-label debut album. It becomes known as "The Purple Album" because of its violet cover, a tribute to Ragsdale's sister, Mandi Ragsdale, 9, who died in a 2001 car accident and whose favorite color was purple.
2004: Ragweed releases the album "Soul Gravy" in March, and it debuts at No. 5 on Billboard's Top Country Albums chart.
2004: Ragweed organizes its first Family Jam, a benefit concert in memory of Mandi Ragsdale, in September at Oklahoma City's Zoo Amphitheatre.
2005: Studio album "Garage" debuts, including a bonus DVD with six videos, with one chronicling the band's 10th anniversary.
2006: Ragweed releases "Back to Tulsa: Live and Loud At Cain's Ballroom," the group's third and final live album to date.
2007: The band records and releases the studio album "Mission California."
More: 'Boys from Oklahoma' concerts at OSU: What to know about parking, tailgating and showtimes
2009: Ragweed releases its studio album "Happiness and All the Other Things," marking the group's 15th anniversary.
2010: The band shocks its followers in May by announcing an indefinite hiatus and canceling that fall's OKC Family Jam. Ragsdale cites needing to spend more time with his family — particularly his special-needs son, JC — as the reason for the hiatus.
2010: Ragweed plays what it seemed would be its final show in October at Joe's on Weed Street in Chicago.
2010: Oklahoma expatriates Canada and Plato, who have long lived in Texas, play their first shows with their new band, Cody Canada & The Departed, in December.
2011: Cross opens Yukon's former 50 Yard Line Club, the first venue where members of Ragweed performed, as Grady's 66 Pub on Jan. 1.
2011: The Departed releases the first of several albums, "This Is Indian Land," a collection of covers of songs by Oklahoma songwriters, in June.
2011: Ragsdale plays drums with fellow Red Dirt standout Stoney LaRue until 2013 and shifts into oil and gas consulting.
2022: Cody Canada & The Departed release a rerecorded version of Ragweed's hit 2004 album "Soul Gravy."
2024: The band sets off frenzied reunion speculation among fans by updating Ragweed's long-dormant Facebook page in September.
2024: Ragweed announces on Oct. 1 a one-night-only "The Boys from Oklahoma" reunion concert, featuring co-headliners Turnpike Troubadours, along with fellow Red Dirt acts The Great Divide, Jason Boland & The Stragglers and LaRue at OSU's Boone Pickens Stadium. Within a week, the reunion has been expanded to four April concerts that sell out in hours, with more than 180,000 tickets sold.
2024: The members of Ragweed reunite in person for the first time in about 12 years at OSU Homecoming, where the band is introduced to the crowd at the Cowboys' Nov. 2 football game vs. Arizona.
2024: Ragsdale's son, JC, dies at home in Yukon on Nov. 23. JC, 25, had a rare form of epilepsy called Lennox Gastaut Syndrome, and people with it sometimes die suddenly and unexpectedly.
2025: The reunited band thrills fans with a short impromptu set Jan. 23 at Mile 0 Fest in Key West, Florida.
2025: The group announces in February another "Boys from Oklahoma" concert, set for Aug. 23 at Baylor University's McLane Stadium in Waco, Texas. The show quickly sells out.
2025: The Departed plays a March 1 show at Cain's Ballroom in Tulsa, where Ragweed is surprised with the news that the band will be inducted into the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame during its April OSU concerts. The reunited quartet also plays a few songs together.
2025: Ragweed will officially reconvene to play their first full concerts together in a decade and a half — and their first stadium shows ever — April 10-13 at OSU in Stillwater.
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: See a timeline of Cross Canadian Ragweed up to its reunion