Dan Keeton - A Victor of the Cross


Dan Keeton was titled a "Victim of Society" at an early age. At 4 years old his mother and father divorced. The court gave custody of Dan to his father and his new step-mother. She couldn't have children and took out her anger physically on Dan and his little brother. There are a lot of things he'd like to forget. One of them was going to school one day with marks on his back so bad that the teacher and principal wouldn't let Dan go home. They put him in the back seat of their car and took him to the police station instead. The state of Michigan decided the best thing for Dan was to be placed into a foster home. They also decided the best foster home was with his step-grandmother. The problem there was, step-mother was never far away and "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

After a short time, the state decided they had fixed the problem and placed Dan back with his father and step-mother. But, nothing had changed and it started all over again. So, Dan's father decided that was enough. They packed a few clothes, went down to the Greyhound bus station. Where Dan, his father and little brother boarded a bus and went to Leitchfield, KY to live with Dan's grandmother, (who was a "saint of God").

In her living room, Dan found a box of cassette tapes and decided it'd be a good idea to listen. He reached in the box and pulled out, "Wanted Live, The Happy Goodman Family". For days, you couldn’t separate Dan from that cassette player. All this was new to him. This music was something a terrorized little 11 year old needed. Why did his grandmother love him - "a bushel and a peck and a hug round the neck"? Because she was a Christian and knew where true love came from.


After a while, someone drove an old school bus into the field across the street and began setting up a large tent. Dan thought the circus was surely setting up right across the street! But, after a few hours those in the tent began playing music and having a great time. It was music just like he had heard on those tapes in that box. So Dan, the 11 year old, went across the street and sat in the back row. By this time you know, it was not the circus. It was a tent meeting and the preacher stopped the music and said, "Someone here needs to listen. You've been through a rough time in your life, but all that is over. God has something great for you, something wonderful for you to do. But, you've got to give him your heart...first." That's where Dan Keeton got out of his chair, walked across the grass, knelt at an altar made of old wooden folding chairs and gave his heart and life to Jesus Christ!

They say that he should be an alcoholic, a drug addict or in prison, because that's just what happens when you go through what Dan did and there's nothing you can do about it. But if you ask him today, He will tell you, "I am not a Victim of Society, I am a Victor of the Cross and God made a difference in my life."

His grandmother took the last of her Social Security check to the pawn shop and bought her grandson a guitar. Dan took that guitar to that cassette player and began playing along with The Happy Goodman Family. And before long he was recording a cassette for his mother. Singing and telling her how much he missed her.

Dan's daddy watched all this happening and re-dedicated his life. He got in his car, drove to Springfield, MO and picked up Dan's real mother. They returned to Kentucky and were re-married again three days later!

Momma had more of this music on records. "The Downings - double album live" was as exciting as anything Dan had ever heard. Listening in to "no doubt about it, I've been saved!" and "Greater is he that is in me". And The Bill Gaither Trio - alleluia...wow!

For the last 3 1/2 years Dan Keeton performed tenor with The Dixie Melody Boys, one of the most highly respected male quartets in Gospel Music today. The awards a accolades for Dan span from Fresno, CA to Washington, DC. There's 27 years of traveling the US telling everyone that God loves them and can change their lives too!

Today, Dan has assembled a quartet to follow in the footsteps of his childhoon heros. From a terrorized little boy, whom they called a "Victim of Society", to an award-winning and successful tenor singer in Southern Gospel Music. With a wife, family and friends all over the country who love him. What more proof do you need that God is real and working miracles today.

You've got to hear this amazing story of how God used Southern Gospel Music to transform a young boy's life. You've also got to hear what the "Branson Review Magazine" discribed as a, "rich, pure high tenor voice". His only desire, through his story, performing the old favorites and his new original songs, is for you to know that God loves you and can heal your family just like God did for him.