Supertone 9393 – Freeman Stowers “The Cotton Belt Porter” – 1929

Posted on November 25, 2025 by R. Connor Montgomery

Of the multitude of artists who achieved regional fame in their day through radio and live performance, only to be forgotten after leaving the limelight, Texas-born harmonica player and animal imitationist Freeman Stowers was one of the lucky few whose work was preserved on record for future generations. But while his recordings have been relatively well known among collector of pre-war blues, his biography has hitherto remained quite unexplored.

Freeman Stowers, pictured in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, December 5, 1926, Page 59. via Newspapers.com, clip page by user puettjoshua. Photograph discovered by Ethan Kelly and Joshua Puett. Copyrighted image used under fair use doctrine (17 U.S.C. § 107).

Freeman Jefferson Stowers, son of George Stowers and the former Mary Menifee, was born in the vicinity of the Brazos River valley in central eastern Texas, most likely in either Grimes or Bell County, on the twenty-fifth of November in an uncertain year—variously reported as 1884, 1893, 1897, 1902, and other years in different documents. He grew up near Anderson, Texas, and spent most of his early adult life working on farms around the small towns of nearby Falls County—Barclay, Lott, Rosebud, and the like. Nicknamed “Shorty”, he was a man of small stature and dark complexion. Surrounded by all manner of animals—both wild and domestic—in the agrarian country of east Texas, Stowers developed a knack for impersonating (imanimalating?) the sounds of said creatures with remarkable verisimilitude. In 1908, Stowers married Miss Ethel Green in Marlin, Texas, and the couple had a daughter named Lillian the following year. That marriage seems to have been rather short-lived, for around 1917 he married Pearl Smith and had two more daughters, Lucille and Bertha. In the 1920s, Stowers began to draw some attention for his imitations of barnyard animals and train sounds, earning him an engagement entertaining the Texas Butter, Egg and Poultry Association at their 1924 convention in Fort Worth. Around the middle part of the same decade, Stowers relocated to St. Louis, Missouri, where he worked as a porter on the St. Louis Southwestern Railway, better known as the Cotton Belt Route. Soon after, his imitations were overheard by the publicity director of the railroad, Mr. A. Campbell McKibbin, who was sufficiently impressed to secure him a spot on the radio. Called a “natural born mimic” and also a proficient harmonica player, Stowers could be heard on Mondays and Fridays at 8:00 P.M. over station KMOX as part of a Cotton Belt program, and he proved to be quite a hit with listeners (as well as their pets). Working on the railroad also brought Stowers far and wide around the nation, and he was called upon to perform in various venues alongside the likewise company sponsored Cotton Belt Quartet (who themselves had made records for Vocalion and Paramount), including a series of appearances back in his home state of Texas at the Cotton Palace in Waco. Around 1927, he remarried yet again, this time to a woman named Ella Strambler, with whom he had three more children: Freeman Jr., Gladys, and Louise. In the early months of 1929, Stowers ventured to Richmond, Indiana. to record for the Starr Piano Company, manufacturers of Gennett Records. Billed as “The Cotton Belt Porter”, he produced a total of five sides in two sessions, of which four were issued: the animal imitations “Texas Wild Cat Chase” and “Sunrise On the Farm”, and the harmonica instrumentals “Medley of Blues” and “Railroad Blues”. The unissued side was an alternate take of “Texas Wild Cat Chase” titled “Texas Wild Cat Hunt” in the Gennett ledgers. Later in the 1920s, he was employed by Purina Mills and continued to perform and broadcast under their sponsorship, adopting the name “Checkerboard Sam” after Purina’s famous logo. At some point after 1934, Stowers took up residence in Fulton, Missouri—where he remained for at least the next two decades—and separated from Ella, who retained custody of their children and later remarried. He was still appearing as “Checkerboard Sam” as late as 1958, and under that name evidently produced another record, a 45 RPM single containing “The Fox Chase” and “The Coon Chase” for Duncan and Gibbs Sales of Milledgeville, Illinois (aural identification indicates that the recording is indeed of Stowers). He eventually returned to St. Louis, where he would remain for the rest of his life, working in later years as a maintenance man. On December 6, 1972, Freeman Stowers died of arteriosclerosis at the St. Louis Chronic Hospital. Though his age was listed as seventy on his death certificate, Social Security records reported it as eighty-eight, reflecting an 1884 birth date. Stowers’s cousin Willie Menifee (1923-1997) of Navasota, Texas, was also a harmonica player and singer of some local repute, who recorded with Mance Lipscomb in the 1960s.

Supertone 9393 was recorded in two sessions in 1929, the first on January 19th, and the second on March 11th, both in Richmond, Indiana. It features Freeman Stowers “The Cotton Belt Porter” playing two unaccompanied harmonica solos, with talking on the first. It was also issued on Gennett 6814 and Champion 15837, and reissued (for some reason) on Supertone 9430.

With a tip-of-the-hat to his hometown of St. Louis, “Railroad Blues”—the first side Stowers recorded—is an archetypal (and quite excellent) train piece much in the vein of those made popular by contemporaneous harmonicists like William McCoy and DeFord Bailey. Quite appropriate considering Stowers line of work at the time.

Railroad Blues, recorded January 19, 1929 by Freeman Stowers “The Cotton Belt Porter”.

On the “B” side, Stowers blows a dandy harp on his “Medley of Blues”, interpolating “All Out and Down”, “Old Time Blues”, and “Hog in the Mountain”. To the average listener, Stowers’s harmonica recordings are considerably more palatable than those of his barking and howling solos.

Medley of Blues, recorded March 11, 1929 by Freeman Stowers “The Cotton Belt Porter”.

Timely 1003 – Otis Hinton – 1954

Posted on June 8, 2025 by R. Connor Montgomery

In our continuing examination of the Texas blues, we have taken a look at some of the most renowned figures—like Blind Lemon Jefferson, Lightnin’ Hopkins, and “Texas” Alexander—as well as some of the more obscure—like “Stick Horse” Hammond, Gene Campbell, and Jesse Lockett. Now, let us turn our attention to one of the obscurest of them all, Dallas bluesman Otis Hinton, and his one record (which, in my opinion, is one of the greatest ever made).

Otis was born Odis Hinton in Jacksonville, Texas, on June 8, 1916 (or 1918), one of eleven children of the Reverend Claude A. and Mae Ollie Hinton. Prior to revelatory research by blues historian Bob Eagle, he was believed to have hailed from Shreveport, Louisiana. After receiving a third grade education, Hinton relocated to Dallas around the age of ten. There, he was surely exposed to the blues scene flourishing in Deep Ellum and its surrounding neighborhoods. As an adult, Hinton stood six feet tall, of dark complexion, and was blind in his right eye. In the early 1940s, he married Rachael Mae Washom, the daughter of a family with whom he had lived for some time prior. The couple had at least two children, Tommie and Odell, the former of whom died in infancy. Though he evidently made his living working menial jobs in white folks’ yards, Hinton was a proficient musician in a style similar to many of his fellow Texas musicians. His skills were presumably of some local renown, as they earned him a listing as a musician in the Dallas city directory. He traveled to New York, purportedly in 1953, to wax four sides for Apollo Records—”No More to Roam”, “Railroad Woman” (or “Beloved Woman” per copyright filing), “Little Woman”, and “Hinton’s Boogie”—none of which ever saw release. Copyrights were filed for all four unissued Apollo recordings on September 9, 1955, perhaps suggesting that they may at one time have been planned for release, or that they were recorded later than attributed (the latter, in my opinion, is the more likely scenario). In 1954, he recorded two additional sides for Apollo founder Hy Siegel’s new record label, Timely, which were released this time around. Back home in Texas, he found work for the Binyon-O’Keefe Company, a storage and moving business in Dallas-Fort Worth. Just over three years after his only record’s release, Hinton was pronounced dead from pneumonia—the same ailment that had claimed his infant son years earlier—at Parkland Hospital on November 18, 1957. He was interred at Lincoln Memorial Cemetery, where his father had previously been buried, as would many more of his family members in years to come. Otis Hinton’s two released recordings have been featured on several reissue compilation since the folk-blues revival of the 1960s. His younger brother “Little Joe” Hinton (1937-2022) was also a noted singer and songwriter, recording a series of soul singles in the 1960s and ’70s.

Timely 1003 was recorded in New York City, probably in early 1954. The date has often been cited as July 7, 1954, however this seems improbable, as it was advertised as a “New R&B Record” in Billboard magazine on June 26, 1954. Otis Hinton accompanies himself on guitar and is joined by an unidentified rhythm section consisting of bass and drums.

Hinton’s “Walkin’ Down Hill” is a loose variant of the classic “Big Road Blues”, made famous by Mississippi bluesman Tommy Johnson in the 1920s. Billboard’s review opined that “Southern blues fans should enjoy this bright reading of a bouncy down-home effort sung by Otis Hinton. He accompanies himself solidly on the guitar. Side could catch loot in the South.” This is one of my favorite sides of all time.

Walkin’ Down Hill, recorded 1954 by Otis Hinton.

“Emmaline” seems to be a variant of the blues standard popularized by Little Son Jackson as “Rockin’ and Rollin'”, also known as “Rock Me, Mama”. Although Hinton’s country blues style might seem somewhat dated in the days of rock ‘n’ roll—and indeed, his record does not seem to have sold particularly well—it would foreshadow the revival of traditional blues that was on the horizon at the time.

Emmaline, recorded 1954 by Otis Hinton.

Paramount 12855 – Will Ezell – 1929

Posted on December 23, 2024 by R. Connor Montgomery

At Old Time Blues, we have developed a tradition of honoring both the legends and the lost of recorded American music—and quite often both are one and the same. In that vein, let us take a look herein at the life and career of Texas native ragtime pianist, boogie-woogie pioneer, and Paramount recording star Will Ezell, and a record that some have hailed as the birth of rock ‘n’ roll.

William Ezell was born in Brenham, Texas, on December 23, 1892, one of six children born to Lorenza and Rachel Ezell. Beginning in his teenage years, Will was playing piano in juke joints and lumber camp barrelhouses around eastern Texas and western Louisiana—the country where boogie-woogie was born. As an itinerant piano player, Ezell was known to have played in various locations from Dallas to New Orleans, where he was living by the time of the First World War. It was perhaps during this time in Louisiana that he encountered blues singer Elzadie Robinson—a native of the Shreveport area—and the two struck up something of a partnership. Around 1925, Ezell and Robinson traveled north to Chicago, where they made their phonograph recording debut for the New York Recording Laboratories of Port Washington, Wisconsin, manufacturers of Paramount Records. Subsequently, between 1926 and 1931, Ezell recorded somewhat prolifically for Paramount, both solo and as an accompanist. He became well known around Chicago as well as Detroit, alongside Charlie Spand and fellow Texas pianist Hersal Thomas. A few of his notable piano recordings include “Barrel House Man”, “Heifer Dust”, “Mixed Up Rag”, “Bucket of Blood”, and “Pitchin’ Boogie”. As an accompanist, Ezell played piano behind such blues singers as Lucille Bogan, Bertha Henderson, Side Wheel Sally Duffie, Blind Roosevelt Graves, and of course Elzadie Robinson. In 1929, he appeared with Blind Lemon Jefferson, Blind Blake, Papa Charlie Jackson, Charlie Spand, and the Hokum Boys on the “Hometown Skiffle”, a “descriptive novelty” record featuring Paramount’s top stars. It has been reported, of uncertain veracity, that Paramount commissioned Ezell to escort the body of their star recording artist Blind Lemon Jefferson home to Texas upon his untimely demise in late 1929. When the Great Depression struck and severely affected Paramount’s recording activities, Ezell’s output slowed considerably, and he made his final known recordings in early 1931, accompanying Sam “Slim” Tarpley on one record. Although he made no further recordings, his existing body of work began to see reissues as early as the 1940s. Subsequently, he reportedly went back on the road, returning for a time to Louisiana, before settling in Chicago permanently by the end of the 1930s, where he found work for the WPA. According to John Steiner—who revived the Paramount label in the late 1940s—Ezell later made appearances alongside fellow former Paramount artists Blind Leroy Garnett and Charlie Spand at the Big Apple Tavern in Chicago, owned by prolific pianist Cripple Clarence Lofton. Ezell called Chicago his home for the rest of his life, and he died there on August 2, 1963.

Paramount 12855 was recorded at the Starr Piano Company’s recording laboratory in Richmond, Indiana, on September 20, 1929. Will Ezell is on the piano, and is accompanied by Blind Roosevelt Graves on guitar, his brother Uaroy Graves on tambourine, and probably “Baby Jay” James on cornet.

Ezell’s hard-driving “Pitchin’ Boogie” is often suggested to be an early antecedent of rock ‘n’ roll, with its stomping barrelhouse piano beat coupled with the guitar and cornet of the Graves brothers’ Mississippi Jook Band making for a prototype of the early rock band lineup.

Pitchin’ Boogie, recorded September 20, 1929 by Will Ezell.

On the “B” side (which the original owner evidently enjoyed more than the former), “Just Can’t Stay Here” dishes out more of the same stuff, but arranged more as a standard twelve-bar blues song than a rent party rollick.

Just Can’t Stay Here, recorded September 20, 1929 by Will Ezell.

Paramount 12650 – Blind Lemon Jefferson – 1928

Posted on September 24, 2024 by R. Connor Montgomery

Back in the days of 78 RPM, it was not an altogether uncommon sight to find records bearing elaborate and often colorful “picture labels” (not to be confused with picture discs), individuating special releases or records by big-time hit-makers from the hoi polloi. The Columbia company was perhaps the chief exploiter of this gimmick, issuing special label designs on many discs by their stars Paul Whiteman and Ted Lewis in the 1920s, and one more on their subsidiary Okeh for Seger Ellis. On the other hand, the New York Recording Laboratory of Port Washington, Wisconsin, manufacturer of Paramount records produced only three such picture labels, which were used for only three different records; the first was in 1924 for their top star “Ma” Rainey, the next for white preacher Rev. J.O. Hanes in 1927, and finally, in 1928, one for their new big moneymaker, Blind Lemon Jefferson.

On a striking bright label of white and (appropriately) lemon yellow—in stark contrast to Paramount’s standard black and gold design—were emblazoned the words “Blind Lemon Jeffersons’ [sic] Birthday Record”. As to exactly what day it was celebrating, that is not concretely known. The most commonly agreed upon date attributed to Lemon Jefferson’s birth is September 24, 1893, supported by both the 1900 and 1910 United States censuses, but others have been suggested. Lemon himself gave a date of October 26, 1894, to one Edward Seaman, registrar of his 1917 draft card, which also seems to be supported by his reported age of twenty-five in the 1920 census. His 1930 obituary in the Wortham Journal gave his age as forty-five, suggesting he was born as early as 1884. Others still have proposed a birth date of July 11, 1897. Some oddities exist surrounding Lemon’s census records, which further complicates matters. In his entry in the 1900 census, the enumerator, one Leonard Carrier, appears to have reported his birth date as “Sept 24”, with the number written in small print above the month, despite the fact that dates of birth were not recorded in that census, only months, and no other birth dates were recorded for other individuals in the same or adjacent pages. Why then, did Mr. Carrier seemingly write down the full date of birth for Lemon and only Lemon? Did he somehow foresee that this six-year-old blind boy would one day be a star, and this information would be valuable one-hundred years from then? Did Lemon’s mother or father give the full date (which incidentally is the only date or month recorded for the entire Jefferson family) and he decided to write it down for the heck of it, despite no space for it being given? Or could this errant “24” have some other obscure meaning, perhaps lost to time? Those are questions which I, at this time, cannot answer. Perhaps some census expert may have better insight. The same census also reported Lemon’s name as “Jefferson, Lemmon\Bl”, which has been misinterpreted to mean that Lemon’s real, full name was “Lemmon B. Jefferson”. That is not the case—in fact, the “Bl” next to his name was to denote his blindness (some censuses contained a separate column to indicate whether the subject was blind, but 1900 did not); so it seems that, at least by the United States federal government, he was already dubbed “Blind Lemon Jefferson” by the age of six. The anomalous spelling of “Lemmon” can be easily discounted as well, for the census was taken orally and filled out be the enumerator, thus numerous spelling errors are present. In any event, Lemon’s “Birthday Record” was released to the public in August of 1928, which could be interpreted as belatedly celebrating his July birthday, or preemptively celebrating his September birthday—that is assuming it was not simply a marketing gimmick irrespective of the actual date of his birth, a prospect that may well be the most probable.

Paramount 12650 was recorded circa March and June of 1928, respectively, and was released in August of the same year, with the first advertisement for it appearing in the Chicago Defender on August 4, 1928.

“Piney Woods Money Mama” is one of Lemon;s lyrical masterworks, one of many songs he recorded which appear to be mostly original, rather than drawn from the “floating verse” tradition, as so many blues songs of his day were. “She got ways like the devil and hair like a Injun squaw; she’s been tryin’ two years to get me to be her son-in-law.”

Piney Woods Money Mama, recorded c. March 1928 by Blind Lemon Jefferson.

On the “B” side, the hoodoo-tinged “Low Down Mojo Blues” is perhaps not as memorable a song as the former, but still a testament to Lemon’s songwriting genius and expressive guitar playing.

Low Down Mojo Blues, recorded c. June 1928 by Blind Lemon Jefferson

Globe 122 – Jesse Lockett with Earl Sims’ Sextette – 1946

Posted on September 23, 2024 by R. Connor Montgomery

Performing and recording alongside more famous contemporaries like Lightnin’ Hopkins, L.C. Williams, and Melvin “Little Son” Jackson, blues shouter Jesse Lockett was a big figure on the 1940s Houston blues scene and a pioneering vocalist in the postwar Texas record industry—notable for making the first blues record to appear on a Texas-based label—yet very little is known of him and his scant recording career today.

Jesse Eugene Lockett was born on September 23, 1912, in Trinity County, Texas. He grew up in Houston, where he attended Wheatley High School. In adulthood, he was described as a heavyset, dark complected man, about five feet, ten inches tall and weighing as much as three-hundred pounds, and was called at point a “buxom and vociferous singer of the blues (all gut bucket).” While living in Houston in the summer of 1935, Lockett—despite a plea of not guilty—was convicted of burglary and theft and sentenced to seven years on the Clemens State Farm in Brazoria County beginning on September 11, 1935. There, on April 16, 1939, noted folklorist John A. Lomax recorded him singing “Worry Blues” and accompanying himself on the guitar in one of his prison recording trips for the Library of Congress. Only a few months later, he was released early, walking free on September 14, 1939. Soon after his release, he formed a band called the Blue Five, which was well received in Houston in the early-to-mid-1940s, making appearances at both public venues and private functions. Known for composing most of his own material, he earned regular mention in the local black newspaper, the Informer and Texas Freeman, in which he was hailed as “Houston’s gift to the music world.” Some of his known appearances included regular revues at the Lincoln Theatre at 711 Prairie Street, nightclub shows, including a bi-weekly “Harlem Review” at Lee Curry’s New Harlem Grill and opening night at Sutton Batteau’s Blue Room, and at least one concert at the City Auditorium. He was often joined in these shows by tap dancer Jimmy De Barber and blackface comedian “Cream Puff” Smith, and he shared the stage at times with such noted bands as LeRoy Hardison’s Carolina Cotton Pickers and I.H. Smalley’s Rockateers. In the early 1940s, Lockett had a string of engagements on the East Coast, and around the same time was purported to have been a “Decca recording artist,” with some of his songs listed as “Defense Blues” and “The New Sugar Ration Blues”, though no evidence of these songs or of Lockett ever recording for Decca appears to exist. A few years later, around late 1945, he made his documented commercial recording debut for Bill Quinn’s Houston-based Gulf label with “Boogie Woogie Mama” and “Blacker the Berry”, the first and only known blues record to appear on the first record label based in Texas. An October 1945 newspaper article reported that Lockett had recorded ten sides for an unnamed “local record company” (presumably Gulf), but only the aforementioned two are known to have been released. Soon after, he ventured out west to join Earl Sims’ Sextette on a pair of jump blues sides recorded for the Los Angeles-based Globe label. Following this stint in California, Lockett returned to Houston, at which point he recorded once again for Bill Quinn—whose Gulf label had become Gold Star—cutting four sides as a vocalist with Will Rowland’s Orchestra (who had apparently traveled with him from California) in late 1948, including “Run Mr. Rabbit Run” and “Reefer Blues”. Afterwards, he seems to have gone back to California, where—apparently finding it hard to stay out of trouble—he was incarcerated again by 1950, this time in the Los Angeles County Jail, ostensibly putting an end to his promising career in music. After serving his sentence again, Lockett remained in California, where he died in San Luis Obispo on March 14, 1966.

Globe 122 was recorded sometime in 1946 in Los Angeles, California, and released the same year. Earl Sims’s Sextette consists of Sims on alto saxophone, Doc Jones on tenor sax, Jimmy Moorman on trumpet, Laurence Robinson on piano, C. LeChuga on string bass, and Felix Gross on drums.

On the record’s first side, Jesse Lockett sings a slow blues of his own composition titled “Mellow Hour Blues”. Lockett seems to have been both a fine singer and songwriter, drawing inspiration from the folk blues tradition.

Mellow Hour Blues, recorded c. 1946 by Jesse Lockett with Earl Sims Sextette.

On the “B” side, Lockett sings a “jump boogie” titled “Hole in the Wall”, not to be confused with the different song of the same name recorded by fellow Texas blues singer L.C. Williams around two years later.

Hole in the Wall, recorded c. 1946 by Jesse Lockett with Earl Sims Sextette