Montgomery Ward M-8861 – Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys – 1940

Posted on September 13, 2025 by R. Connor Montgomery

In this website dedicated to honoring the legends and the lost of American music, it would seem terribly remiss to not pay tribute to such a tremendous figure as mandolinist, singer, and founder of the bluegrass genre, Bill Monroe—falling, needless to say, into the former category. In fact, it would be nearly impossible to overstate the man’s legacy.

Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys at the time of their Bluebird recordings. From Bluebird catalog.

William Smith Monroe was born into a musically inclined family on September 13, 1911, in Rosine, Kentucky, the eighth and youngest child of Buck and Malissa Monroe. Among his early musical influences were his uncle, fiddle player Pendleton Vandiver—with whom he lived after his parents’ deaths, and to whom he dedicated his popular song “Uncle Pen”—and black guitarist and fiddler Arnold Shultz. As his older brothers Charlie and Birch already played guitar and fiddle, young Bill was relegated to playing the mandolin. Together with them, Bill began playing music in a professional manner in 1929. After Birch departed and the group became a duo consisting of just Bill and Charlie, the Monroe Brothers made their recording debut for RCA Victor subsidiary Bluebird in 1936, producing some popular records such as the sacred song “What Would You Give Me in Exchange?”. The act was not particularly long-lived however, as the brothers tended to butt heads, and they went their separate ways in 1938. Subsequently, Bill formed a new band—dubbed the Blue Grass Boys, for his home state of Kentucky—and in 1939 auditioned for WSM’s Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee. His rendition of Jimmie Rodgers’s “Mule Skinner Blues” impressed the Solemn Old Judge, and the Blue Grass Boys became a mainstay of that program for decades to come. A year after their Opry debut, Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys made their first recordings for Bluebird, foreshadowing the genre of music that would be named in the group’s honor. Over the years, Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys employed such future bluegrass luminaries as Clyde Moody, David (“Stringbean”) Akeman, Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, and Jimmy Martin, all of whom would go on to be stars in their own rights. In 1945, the group went to Columbia Records, and in 1949 on to Decca, producing hits for each, including “Blue Moon of Kentucky” and “New Mule Skinner Blues”. Although his success dipped in the 1950s with the birth of rock ‘n’ roll and more modern styles of country music, Monroe and his bluegrass enjoyed renewed popularity during the folk music revival of he 1960s, and the musical form over which he reigned found a dedicated community of musicians and fans that has persisted to the present day. Bill Monroe continued to perform and lead the Blue Grass Boys until months before his death on September 9, 1996, four days before he would have been eighty-five.

Montgomery Ward M-8861 was recorded on October 7, 1940 in the Kimball House Hotel at 30 South Pryor Street in Atlanta, Georgia. The Blue Grass Boys are Bill Monroe on mandolin and guitar, Clyde Moody on guitar and mandolin, Tommy Magness on fiddle, and Willie “Cousin Wilbur” Wesbrooks on string bass. It was originally released as Bluebird B-8568 on November 22, 1940. Side A was reissued on RCA Victor 20-3163 in 1948.

Bill Monroe sings and plays the guitar, while Clyde Moody takes the mandolin, on the Blue Grass Boys’ legendary rendition of the Jimmie Rodgers classic, “Mule Skinner Blues”., the number that won Monroe a place on the prestigious Grand Ole Opry.

Mule Skinner Blues, recorded October 7, 1940 by Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys.

On the “B” side, Clyde Moody sings the baritone vocal on the twelve-bar blues of his own composition, “Six White Horses” (not to be confused with the Tommy Cash song of later years).

Six White Horses, recorded October 7, 1940 by Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys.

Decca 5958 – Ernest Tubb – 1941/1940

Posted on February 9, 2019 by R. Connor Montgomery

Ernest Tubb with Jimmie Rodgers’s Martin guitar. Circa early-to-mid-1940s.

On the ninth of February, we celebrate the birth of one of the brightest shining stars in all of country music: the Texas Troubadour, my cousin, Ernest Tubb.

Ernest Dale Tubb was born on February 9, 1914, in the now-ghost town of Crisp, Texas, the son of cotton sharecroppers Calvin Tubb and Ellen Baker, whose mother died while she was still an infant, and her father, purportedly a full-or-half-blooded Cherokee, left to start anew. As a youth, he worked as a soda jerk, but like so many of his generation, hearing Jimmie Rodgers inspired the young Tubb to pick up a guitar and start singing and yodeling. In the middle of the 1930s, Tubb began singing on San Antonio’s KONO, an unpaid job which required him to seek employment digging ditches for the WPA. He soon established contact with Jimmie Rodgers’s widow Carrie (née Williamson), who befriended the young singer and indefinitely loaned him her late husband’s custom Martin 000-45 guitar. She also brought the young Tubb to the attention of the RCA Victor Corporation, for whom Jimmie had recorded. When the record company made one of its field trips to San Antonio in October of 1936, Ernest Tubb made his first recordings, singing solo accompanied by his own guitar on six sides, and accompanying Mrs. Jimmie Rodgers in another one, a tribute to her departed husband. Of Tubb’s solo recordings, only one record was released initially, another tribute to the Singing Brakeman, featuring “The Passing of Jimmie Rodgers” and “The Last Thoughts of Jimmie Rodgers” on the Bluebird label, the others were held back for several years. He was behind the recording microphone for a second time when RCA Victor was back in San Antonio the following March, and he recorded two more solo sides, this time backed on second guitar by his friend Buff Buffington, and another one backing Mrs. Rodgers, all of which were released this time. All Tubb’s Bluebird records sold quite poorly, and it would be several years before he returned to the studio. In 1939, a tonsillectomy instigated a shift from singing to focus greater on writing songs.

Come 1940, Ernest Tubb got a better gig singing on the radio, sponsored by the Gold Chain flour company, but at seventy-five dollars a week, it still wasn’t enough to make ends meet. The same year, he also began a new recording contract with Decca, and he made his first records for them at the Rice Hotel in Houston on April 4, 1940, beginning with “Blue Eyed Elaine”, dedicated to his wife. His records continued to attract limited public attention, and Tubb was contemplating throwing in the towel, but things turned around after a 1941 session in Dallas, when his original composition “Walking the Floor Over You” became an unexpected hit. Its success was such that it precipitated a move to Hollywood, where Tubb made a few film appearances, and earned him membership in the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville in 1943, an engagement which lasted four decades. Soon, he became known as the “Texas Troubadour”, a name which was later applied to his band as well. He made some patriotic songs of note during the War, such as “Soldier’s Last Letter”, and by the last year of the 1940s, Tubb had charted seven hit records, including an early recording of “Blue Christmas”. Tubb’s music helped to popularize honky-tonk style country music, and earned him a devoted base of fans. His success continued in the decades to come, with hits like 1965’s “Waltz Across Texas”, and he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in the same year. Following a life well spent, Ernest Tubb died on August 14, 1984 in Nashville, Tennessee.

Side A of Decca 5958 was recorded at Bunny Biggs’ Sound Recording Studios, Inc. in Dallas, Texas, on April 26, 1941 and in Los Angeles on October 30, 1940, respectively. On the “A” side, Tubb is accompanied by his own guitar, WBAP staff musician Fay “Smitty” Smith on steel guitar, and an unknown string bass. On “B”, he is accompanied only by his and Dick Ketner’s guitars.

First, Tubb sings the first (and, in my very humble opinion, the best) of many recorded versions of his famous hit song, “Walking the Floor Over You”. Tubb was inspired to write the song while separated from his family as he worked to build a career for himself in the show business, spending many lonely hours on the road. The result was something magical, with a sincerity that few but Tubb could deliver. Real, good, country music.

Walking the Floor Over You, recorded April 26, 1941 by Ernest Tubb.

On the flip-side, Tubb sings a song written by Jimmie Rodgers’ widow, Carrie Williamson Rodgers: “I’m Missing You”.

I’m Missing You, recorded October 30, 1940 by Ernest Tubb.

Decca 5828 – Bob Dunn’s Vagabonds – 1940

Posted on February 5, 2019 by R. Connor Montgomery

Bob Dunn, behind Lonnie Glosson, from a group photo published by XEPN, Piedras Negras, Mexico, c.1938.

Continuing in Old Time Blues’ tradition of honoring the heroes of western swing music, this post is dedicated to a figure of immense significance to the genre, the father of electric steel guitar, Bob Dunn.

Robert Lee Dunn was born in Fort Gibson, Oklahoma, on February 5, 1908. The son of a fiddler, Bob followed in his father’s musical footsteps, taking up slide guitar and playing Hawaiian music, as was enjoying a surge of popularity at the time, drawing influence from leading players such as Sol Ho’opi’i. Inspired by the music of those like Jack Teagarden, Dunn soon shifted toward jazz, and added an electric pickup to his guitar, playing in an idiosyncratic brassy style peculiar to him. In the late 1920s, he played in groups such as the Panhandle Cowboys and Indians, before winding up in Fort Worth in 1934. There, he joined Milton Brown’s Musical Brownies, with whom he pioneered the use of steel guitar in western swing music. He made his recording debut in the Brownies first Decca session on January 27, 1935, purportedly earning him the distinction of being the first musician to record with an electrified steel guitar. Dunn remained with the Brownies until Brown’s untimely death in 1936, after which he went on to play with Roy Newman’s Boys and Cliff Bruner’s Texas Wanderers before forming a band of his own—the Vagabonds—with whom he made several records for Decca from 1938 to 1940. After the Vagabonds broke up, Dunn played in a variety of different western swing bands, including Bill Boyd’s Cowboy Ramblers, Dickie McBride’s Village Boys, Bill Mounce’s Sons of the South, and the Sons of Dixie. He retired from his performing career in 1950 and opened a music store in Houston. Bob Dunn died on May 27, 1971.

Decca 5828 was recorded on April 11, 1940 in Houston, Texas at Dunn’s Vagabonds’ last session. The Vagabonds are Bob Dunn on steel guitar, possibly Rudy Rivera on clarinet, Sam Jones on electric tenor guitar, an unknown second guitar, Mancel Tierney on piano, and Hezzie Bryant on string bass.

On the first side, Dunn shows off his unique style of playing on his hot instrumental composition “Juke Box Rag”.

Juke Box Rag, recorded April 11, 1940 by Bob Dunn’s Vagabonds.

Next, Dunn himself sings a crooning vocal on another of his own compositions, “I’ll Forget Dear (That I Ever Loved You)”.

I’ll Forget Dear (That I Ever Loved You), recorded April 11, 1940 by Bob Dunn’s Vagabonds.

Okeh 05668 – Ted Daffan’s Texans – 1940

Posted on September 21, 2018 by R. Connor Montgomery

In Old Time Blues’ continuing cavalcade of Texas’ native music, western swing, we turn our spotlight to the accomplished steel guitarist and composer of such standard songs as “Born to Lose”: Ted Daffan.

Ted Daffan and his Texans, pictured in the Hillbilly Hit Parade of 1941. From left-to-right standing: Buddy Buller, Chuck Keeshan, probably Elmer Christian; seated: Ralph Smith, Ted Daffan, and probably Harry Sorensen.

Theron Eugene Daffan was born in the Beauregard Parish of Louisiana on September 21, 1912, but he got across the border to Texas as fast as he could. He graduated from high school in Houston and later found work there in a musical instrument shop. Inspired by Milton Brown’s music, Daffan became a pioneering user of the electrified steel guitar, following in the footsteps of the Musical Brownies’ Bob Dunn. During the days of the Great Depression, he played steel guitar in Hawaiian radio bands before moving on to Texas swing bands like Shelly Lee Alley’s Alley Cats and the Bar-X Cowboys. In 1939, Daffan composed “Truck Driver’s Blues”, one of the earliest examples of what was to become a common theme in country music—supposedly Daffan would see truck drivers come into restaurants while he was dining and go straight for the jukebox, and he wanted a part of that racket—which became a hit for Cliff Bruner’s Boys and the Light Crust Doughboys. As a result of that success, Daffan was signed by CBS in 1940 to record with his own band, the Texans, for their Okeh label. With his Texans, Daffan had hits with “Worried Mind”, “I’m a Fool to Care”, and “Born to Lose”, all compositions of his own, and all of which became standards in their own right. Like Bob Wills, Daffan relocated to California in the 1940s and led a band there, but only stayed for a couple of years before returning to Texas. After World War II, he began shifting his career focus away from playing and recording music and more toward songwriting and publishing, and he founded and owned both record and music publishing companies. Ted Daffan died in Houston on October 6, 1996.

Okeh 05668 was recorded on April 25, 1940 at the Burrus Mill Studio in Saginaw, Texas. It is Ted Daffan and his Texans’ first record. Daffan’s Texans are made up of Ted Daffan on lap steel guitar, Sidney “Buddy” Buller on electric tenor guitar, Chuck Keeshan on second guitar, Harry Sorensen on accordion, Ralph Smith on piano, and Elmer Christian on string bass.

The first side the Texans recorded, Chuck Keeshan sings the Tommy Duncan-style vocal on Daffan’s own composition, the classic “Worried Mind”.

Worried Mind, recorded April 25, 1940 by Ted Daffan’s Texans.

On the flip-side, Daffan showcases his steel-guitar playing abilities on the instrumental “Blue Steel Blues”.

Blue Steel Blues, recorded April 25, 1940 by Ted Daffan’s Texans.

Bluebird B-8621 – Riley Puckett – 1940

Posted on May 7, 2018 by R. Connor Montgomery

Riley Puckett in the late 1930s or early 1940s. His most frequently published portrait.

With euphonious singing voice, enticing guitar playing, and a wide and diverse repertoire ranging from old folk ballads to modern pop songs, Riley Puckett, dubbed the “Bald Mountain Caruso” or sometimes “King of the Hillbillies” (an honorific contested by Uncle Dave Macon), was one of the most popular and prolific rural musicians of the pre-World War II era, both solo and as a member of Gid Tanner’s Skillet Lickers.

George Riley Puckett was born either in Alpharetta, Georgia or thrity-five miles away in Dallas on May 7, 1894. He was blinded in infancy by a treatment for an eye infection gone awry, though those who knew him suggested that he could still tell light from dark. Subsequently, he attended the Georgia School for the Blind in Macon, at which Blind Willie McTell would later enroll. Taking up the banjo at twelve and later switching to guitar, Puckett soon made a name for himself at fiddler’s conventions with his playing and singing, his beautiful voice and exceptional range earning him the nickname the “Bald Mountain Caruso”. He was also noted for his unique method of guitar playing, relying on dynamic runs. On September 28, 1922, Puckett made his radio debut with Clayton McMichen’s Home Town Band on Atlanta’s WSB. In February of 1924, Riley Puckett and fiddle player Gid Tanner cut test recordings for Columbia, and in March they pair traveled to New York to record for the first time in two sessions. His “Rock All Our Babies to Sleep” has often been cited as the first “country” record to feature yodeling, a full three years before Jimmie Rodgers made his first records. After those two sessions, boy did the floodgates open; from 1924 to 1931, Puckett recorded nearly two-hundred titles for Columbia, notwithstanding the eighty-five plus he made as a member of the Skillet Lickers, with hits like “My Carolina Home” cementing him as one of their best-selling artists in the Old Familiar Tunes series. After a break from recording during the Great Depression, Riley made his triumphant return in 1934 when he signed with Bluebird, ultimately producing nearly another hundred titles, including perhaps his best known song “Ragged but Right”. A 1937 side venture took him to Decca for a further twelve. Riley also sang on radio stations all around the South and Midwest; by the end of the 1930s, he was singing on WNOX in Knoxville, Tennessee. After ten sessions for Bluebird, he had his final record date on October 2, 1941 in Atlanta. Riley Puckett died from blood poisoning, the result of an infected boil, on July 13, 1946.

Bluebird B-8621 was recorded on October 1, 1940 in Atlanta, Georgia. Riley Puckett is accompanied by his own guitar and an unknown woman mandolin player. It was concurrently issued on Montgomery Ward M-8885.

First up, Riley sings one of my favorites, a song that got its start in Tin Pan Alley with Porter Grainger and Everett Robbins’ “‘Tain’t Nobody’s Biz-ness if I Do” in 1922, which through some twists and turns and lyrical adjustments, found its way—perhaps by way of the medicine show circuit—into Southern folk and blues repertoires as “Nobody’s Business” or some variation on that, seeing recordings by Earl Johnson’s Dixie Entertainers in 1927, Mississippi John Hurt in 1928, and many others. Riley himself recorded it three times, first on an unissued recording for Columbia in 1924, then twice more for Bluebird, in 1935 and—this one—in 1940.

Nobody’s Business, recorded October 1, 1940 by Riley Puckett.

On the flip, Puckett does his version of a popular big band hit of the day, Saxie Dowell’s “Playmates”—the melody of which was lifted from Charles L. Johnson’s 1904 intermezzo “Iola”—and gives a heck of a good delivery to boot. Perhaps I just have my mind in the gutter, but with all the “climb up my apple tree, look down my rain barrel, slide down my cellar door,” this sure sounds like a lot of double entendre to me!

Playmates, recorded October 1, 1940 by Riley Puckett.