John Lomax’s father was living in Holmes County between the Black and Yazoo rivers on the eastern edge of the Mississippi delta before the Civil War. [1] It had not been developed by cotton planters because it had a different soil type than they knew was good for the plant. The part of Alabama where Tartt lived, the green on the map below, had rich dark soils created when the area had been a sea shore during the Cretaceous era of dinosaurs. [2]
In 1860, the bulge in the blue area of Mississippi on the map was 90% undeveloped with large areas of swamp. After the war freedmen and poor whites cleared land and sold the wood to timber companies to earn money to buy land. [3] Charles Reagon Wilson observed:
"Freedmen from across the South saw in the post-Civil War Delta a frontier of opportunity, a relatively undeveloped region without the long settled social arrangements of the eastern South and with land that could be richly productive if cleared. Blacks hoped for land ownership during Reconstruction and asserted their political rights in the Delta." [4]
James Avery Lomax left Mississippi for Texas to escape the chaos of Reconstruction in 1869. "The ruling classes possessing all the culture and intelligence were financially ruined, and the State was in the hands of unscrupulous ‘carpet baggers’ and ignorant negroes. I did not wish my family raised in contact with the negroes, either as slaves or as ‘freed-men’." [5]
As mentioned in the post for 27 January 2019, John published the first important collection of cowboy songs in 1910. He sketched out a much more ambitious folklore project to the Library of Congress than simply collecting more western songs from people like Nancy Humble Griffin. He wanted to expand the material he’d published in American Ballads and Folk Songs in 1934. [6]
However, like Lydia Parrish, he discovered, it was far easier to want to collect songs from strangers than it was to do so. [7] He found Ruby Pickens Tartt through her contributions to the Federal Writers Project, which he was advising in 1937. [8]
In 1939, his son, Alan Lomax
"hosted the American School of the Air, a CBS radio program that featured traditional material—sometimes live singers and sometimes their recordings—paired with the radio orchestra’s folksong interpretations. During these broadcasts, Lomax invited listeners to write in with suggestions. Some did, and as part of a fall 1940 folksong collecting trip for the Library of Congress, John and Ruby Lomax followed up several of the contacts generated by Alan’s radio series." [9]
One person who sent material was Irene Williams. She was living in Oxford, Mississippi, but may have been raised in the Delta on a plantation in Sunflower County. Her brother-in-law had land near Rome and her brother’s farm was farther north near Drew. Like Dick Reeves, [10] she had put together a musical program for appearances at local women’s clubs. [11]
She was at Robert Williams’ plantation, when the Lomax arrived unannounced in October, 1940. He followed her and recorded some songs by field hands at her brother’s place, [12] including "Oh Lordy, won’t You come by here?" The Library of Congress catalog only listed the singers’ names, Velma Mosley, Wash Dawson, and Albert Williams.
While Griffin was well-known in her part of Texas, these three were obscure with commonplace names. Their parents could have moved to Sunflower County from anywhere in the South. One can only deduce details about them from their recordings. Lomax recorded Williams and Myrtle Lee singing "Bird in the Cage." [13] The metaphor was used in a number of folk and popular songs. [14]
Dawson also performed "Keep yo’ hand on the throttle." [15] The identifying line was borrowed from "Life Is like a Mountain Railroad" that had been recorded by the Pace Jubilee Singers in 1929 and released in 1932. [16] They already had recorded a version of "Lawdy Won’t You Come By Here" in Chicago in 1927. [17]
It may be Dawson learned both songs from recordings. B.B. King was born in another part of Sunflower County in 1925. Before his mother died in the late 1930s, he visited a great-aunt who had a "crank-up Victrola" [18] in her "sharecropper’s cabin." [19] He remembered "she’d go into town and find records." [20]
Thus, someone in the area where Dawson working in the 1930s sold African-American records. King remembered Mima had shellac 78s made by Blind Lemon Jefferson, [21] Lonnie Johnson, [22] Duke Ellington, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, and Mamie Smith. [23] In addition to the blues and early jazz artists, she also had gospel music performances, including one by J. M. Reverend Gates. [24]
The only other thing known about Dawson is his "Throttle" was recorded in 1950 by Brother Rodney in Philadelphia. [25] That, in turn, was adapted by Ira Tucker for the Dixie Hummingbird’s "Christian’s Automobile" in 1957. [26] How Rodney learned Dawson’s song is unknown [27], but there’s little mystery in how the Hummingbirds learned Rodney’s song. They were living in Philadelphia in the 1950s. [28]
Availability
Velma Mosley, Wash Dawson, and Albert Williams. "Oh Lordy Won’t You Come By Here." Collected by John Lomax and Ruby Terrill Lomax, Drew, Mississippi. October 1940. Archives of American Folk Song.
Graphics
US Department of Agriculture. Natural Resources Conservation Service. "Vertisols Map." NRCS website.
End Notes
1. "Recollections of J. A. Lomax, as Dictated to W. F. Graves." 142-146 in Joseph Lomax. "Genealogical and Historical Sketches of the Lomax Family." Grand Rapids, Michigan: The Rookus Printing House, 1894. 143.
2. Craig McClain. "How Presidential Elections Are Impacted by a 100 Million Year Old Coastline." Deep Sea News. 27 June 2012. Cited by Wikipedia, "Black Belt (U.S. Region)."
3. John C. Willis. Forgotten Time: The Yazoo-Mississippi Delta after the Civil War. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2000. Cited by Wikipedia, "History of Mississippi."
4. Charles Reagan Wilson. "Mississippi Delta. Southern Spaces website. 4 April 2004.
5. James Avery Lomax. 144.
6. John Avery Lomax and Alan Lomax. American Ballads and Folk Songs. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1934.
7. For more of Parrish, see the post for 2 October 2018.
8. Ruby Pickens Tartt was discussed in the post for 23 January 2019.
9. Stephen Wade. The Beautiful Music All Around Us. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2012. 78. Ruby was John’s wife.
10. Reeves was discussed in the post for 6 January 2019.
11. Wade. 78.
12. Wade. 78.
13. Myrtle Lee and Albert Williams. "Bird in the Cage." Collected by John Lomax and Ruby Terrill Lomax, Drew, Mississippi. October 1940. Archives of American Folk Song.
14. "Lyr req: Bird in a cage." Mudcat Café. Thread started 3 November 2006.
15. W. D. Dawson. "Keep yo’ hand on the throttle." Collected by John Lomax and Ruby Terrill Lomax, Drew, Mississippi. October 1940. Archives of American Folk Song.
16. Pace Jubilee Singers. "Life Is like a Mountain Railroad." Victor 23350. 1932. The tune was written by Charles Davis Tillman in 1892 to a poem by M. E. Abbey.
17. Pace Jubilee Singers. "Lawdy Won’t You Come By Here." Brunswick 7009. 1927.
18. B.B. King. Blues All Around Me. With David Ritz. New York: Avon Books, 1996. 21. King was discussed in the post for 13 April 2018.
19. King. 22.
20. King. 22.
21. King. 22.
22. King. 23.
23. King. 24.
24. King. 24.
25. Brother Rodney. "Keep Your Hand On The Throttle." Gotham 645. 1950.
26. Dixie Hummingbirds. "Christian’s Automobile." Peacock 1780. 1957.
27. Opal Louis Nations. "Part 2 – Liner Notes to Devil Can’t Harm A Praying Man – Texas Gospel, Vols. 3-5)." He mentioned the three recordings, but had no information on Dawson.
28. Jerry Zolten. Great God A’Mighty! The Dixie Hummingbirds. Oxford University Press. No page numbers on copy available on-line.
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