The Ragtime Fool
Page 31
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More than fifty years have passed since that dedication ceremony. By the 1950s, the Ku Klux Klan no longer held open meetings in Liberty Park, and thereafter faded into memory as an organization openly dedicated to the intimidation of Blacks and other allegedly-inferior ethnic groups. Today in Sedalia, Whites sit with Blacks in restaurants and theaters, and people of all races live side-by-side throughout the city. Lincolnville has become increasingly a ghost neighborhood of abandoned small houses and vacant lots, one of which, at 1001 Osage Avenue, was the site of Tom Ireland’s home. And as Luella Rohrbaugh predicted, the destruction of Scott Joplin’s journal did not impede the growth of regard and respect for his music. Every year during the first week in June, Sedalia swings to a syncopated beat, thanks to the lively, well-attended Scott Joplin Ragtime Festival.
I sympathized with Mrs. Rohrbaugh, Tom Ireland, and Isaac Stark, but couldn’t help hoping that Rudi Blesh might succeed in convincing the trio to preserve the journal and have it sealed until all those who would have been harmed or embarrassed by revelation of its contents had passed beyond those concerns. Clearly, there was interesting material in that book. Just why did Miss Luella Sheldon resort to such bizarre and dramatic measures to coerce young Brun Campbell to leave Sedalia in 1899? Even more intriguing, what went on among Brun, Scott Joplin, the Starks, and lawyer Robert Higdon that ended with multiple deaths and a cover-up, and was so potentially explosive as to cause Tom Ireland to fear for the safety of Brun, Isaac, and others if the episode were to become public, a half-century after the fact? What transpired late in Joplin’s life between him and Irving Berlin? Or, as Ireland put it, what did Joplin think transpired?
Thanks to Luella Sheldon Rohrbaugh, you won’t find this information in any work of history. But it is available to interested parties in two books, The Ragtime Kid and The King of Ragtime, both by Larry Karp, who, being a novelist and therefore destitute of conscience, scruples or principles, has laid out the sordid affairs in full detail.
***
When I visited Sedalia last June for the 2008 Joplin Festival, I found that during the previous year, Hubbard High School had been demolished. I wondered what had become of the plaque that had been put up fifty-seven years earlier, to honor Joplin. No one I talked to had any idea of its whereabouts.
***
The Uptown Theatre on Ohio Avenue, where Eileen Klein sold tickets on Saturdays, has been dark for many years. But there’s talk now among Sedalians about renovating the old building and converting it into a ragtime museum.
Selected Ragtime Resources
Radio Shows
“The Ragtime Machine,” David Reffkin, Host. KUSF-FM, San Francisco, Monday, 9-10 pm Pacific Time.
Streaming at http://www.live365.com/stations/kusf
“Ragtime America,” Jack Rummel, Host. KGNU-FM, Boulder, Thursday (except 2nd of month), 8-9pm Mountain Time
Streaming at www.kgnu.org
Websites
Edward A. Berlin’s Website of Ragtime and Scholarship.
www.edwardaberlin.com/index.htm/
Jack Rummel’s Ragtime Music Reviews.
www.ragtimers.org/reviews/
“Perfessor” Bill Edwards’ Ragtime MIDI, Sheet Music, Nostalgia and Ragtime Resource.
http://www.perfessorbill.com/
Scott Joplin International Ragtime Foundation
http://www.scottjoplin.org/
West Coast Ragtime Society
http://www.westcoastragtime.com/
Indiana Historical Society
http://www.indianahistory.org/
John William (Blind) Boone Society
http://www.blindboone,missouri.org/
Library of Congress Home Page
http://www.loc.gov/index.html/
Mississippi State University Libraries
http://library.msstate.edu/
A Ragtime Compendium
http://users.chariot.net.au/~mathewm/
Parlor Songs MIDI Collection.
http://www.parlorsongs.com/
John Roache’s Ragtime MIDI Library
http://www.johnroachemusic.com/
Colin D. MacDonald’s Ragtime-March-Waltz Web Site
http://www.ragtimemusic.com/
Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project.
http://www.cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/
The Ragtime Ephemeralist.
http://home.earthlink.net/~ephemeralist/index.html
The Lester S. Levy Sheet Music Collection
http://levysheetmusic.mse.jhu.edu/
Historic American Sheet Music
http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/hasm/
Selected Bibliography
Brun Campbell, The Ragtime Kid
Affeldt, Paul A. The Last of the Professors. Jazz Report, Vol 3, No 1, Oct 1961.
Affeldt, Paul A. The Saga of S. Brun Campbell. The Mississippi Rag, Jan 1988.
Anonymous. Looking Backwards. Round the “Houses” with Brun Campbell. Jazz Journal, Jun 1949.
Campbell, Brun. Early Great White Ragtime Composers and Pianists. Jazz Journal, Vol 2, May 1949.
Campbell, Brun. From Rags To Ragtime and Riches. Jazz Journal, Vol 2, No 7, July 1949.
Campbell, Brun. More on Ragtime. Jazz Journal, May 1951.
Campbell, Brun. Ragtime (Silk Stockings, Short Skirts, Silk Blouses, and Velvet Jackets). Jazz Journal, Vol 2, Apr 1949.
Campbell, Brunson. The Amazing Story of the Silver Half Dollar and the Ragtime Kid. Venice Independent, Oct 24, 1947.
Campbell, S. Brun. From Rags to Ragtime, A Eulogy. Jazz Report, Vol 6, 1967.
Campbell, S. Brun (as told to R. J. Carew). How I Became a Pioneer Rag Man of the 1890s. The Record Changer, 1947.
Campbell, S. Brunson. Letters to Jerry Heermans, unpublished.
Campbell, S. Brunson. Preserve Genuine Early Ragtime. The Jazz Record, c 1946.
Campbell, S. Brunson. Ragtime Begins. The Record Changer, Vol 7, Mar 1948.
Campbell, S. Brunson and Carew, R. J. Sedalia, Cradle of Ragtime. The Record Changer, Jun 1945.
Campbell, S. Brunson. The Ragtime Kid (An Autobiography). Jazz Report, Vol 6, 1967-68.
Campbell, S. Brunson. They All Had It. The Jazz Record, c 1946.
Claghorn, Charles Eugene. Biographical Dictionary of American Music, Parker Publishing Company, West Nyack NY, 1973.
Egan, Richard. Brun Campbell, The Rag-Time Warp. Electronic publication, undated.
Egan, Richard A., Jr. Brun Campbell, The Music of “The Ragtime Kid”. Morgan Publishing, St. Louis, 1993.
Lasswell, Paul. Some Thoughts About Brun Campbell And Ragtime.
Rag Times, May 1980.
Levin, Floyd. Brun Campbell, the Original Ragtime Kid of the 1890s. Jazz Journal, Vol 23, Dec 1970.
Thompson, Kay C. Reminiscing in Ragtime, an Interview with Brun Campbell. Jazz Journal, Vol 3, No 4, Apr 1950.
Carew, Roy and Fowler, Don E. Scott Joplin: Overlooked Genius. The Record Changer, Sept, Oct, Dec 1944.
Willick, George C. Brun’s Boys. Jazz Report, Vol 10, No 2, May 1981.
Rudi Blesh
Hasse, John Edward. Rudi Blesh and the Ragtime Revivalists. In Ragtime, Its History, Composers, and Music. Schirmer Books, New York, 1985.
Morath, Max. Rudi Blesh: A Profile. Mississippi Rag, Nov 1998.
Morath, Max. Personal communications.
Curd, Richard Sr. (Sassafras Sam)
Lang, Hazel. Springtime and Sassafras. In Life in Pettis County, 1815-1973. Privately published, 1975.
Singer, Betty. Personal communications.
Tom Ireland
Anonymous. Tom Ireland, Nephew of Texas Governor, Born Just 8 Days After Slavery Abolished. Sedalia Democrat, May 18, 1952.
Anonymous. Another Year Rolls Around Thursday for Tom Ireland. Sedalia Democrat, Dec 8, 1955.
Anonymous. Tom Ireland Dies Friday; Known for Varied Talents.
Sedalia Democrat, Nov 1, 1963.
Anonymous. Tom Ireland, Link to Joplin Years. Sedalia Democrat, Jul 21, 1974.
Ireland, G. Tom. Letter To Brun Campbell, unpublished, Jul 19, 1947.
Lang, Hazel. Tom Ireland, A Gentleman Of Color And Character. In Life in Pettis County, 1815-1973. Privately published, 1975.
Singer, Betty. Personal communications.
Lottie Joplin
Berlin, Edward A. In King of Ragtime. Oxford University Press, New York, 1994.
Berlin, Edward A. Personal communications.
Thompson, Kay C. Lottie Joplin. The Record Changer, Vol 9, Oct 1949.
Histories of Ragtime
Berlin, Edward A. King of Ragtime. Oxford University Press, New York, 1994.
Blesh, Rudi and Janis, Harriet. They All Played Ragtime. Grove Press, New York, 1959.
Gammond, Peter. Scott Joplin and the Ragtime Era. St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1976.
Haskins, James. Scott Joplin. Doubleday, New York, 1978.
Hasse, John Edward, ed. Ragtime, Its History, Composers and Music. Schirmer Books, New York, 1985.
Jasen, David A. and Gene Jones. That American Rag. Schirmer Books, New York, 2000.
Jasen, David A. and Tichenor, Trebor Jay. Rags and Ragtime. Dover Publications Inc, New York, 1978.
Waldo, Terry. This Is Ragtime. Da Capo Press, New York, 1991.
Waldo, Terry. This Is Ragtime. The Complete 1972 NPR Radio Series. Waldo-Lee Music Productions, New York, 2008.
Social, Political, & Historical Aspects of Life in Sedalia in 1951
Anonymous. McCoy’s City Directory For Sedalia MO, 1899.
Anonymous. Choral Club Sings Tonight. Sedalia Democrat, Apr 17, 1951.
Anonymous. Concert as a Tribute to Scott Joplin. Sedalia Democratt, Apr 15, 1951.
Anonymous. Plaque to the Memory of Scott Joplin. Sedalia Democrat, April 8, 1951.
Anonymous. Scott Joplin Memorial Plaque Presented by the Choral Club. Sedalia Democrat, April 18, 1951.
Claycomb, William B. Pettis County Missouri, A Pictorial History. The Donning Company Publishers, Virginia Beach, VA, 1998.
Imhauser, Becky Carr. All Along Ohio Street. Walsworth Publishing Company, Marceline, MO, 2006.
Imhauser, Rebecca Carr. Images of America: Sedalia. Arcadia Publishing, Charleston, SC, 2007.
Lang, Hazel N. Life In Pettis County, 1815-1973. Privately published, 1975.
McVey, W.A. History of Pettis County, and Sedalia, MO. Privately published, 1985.
Neibarger, Clyde B. Ragtime Pioneers In Sedalia, Mo. Gave That Music a Big Boost Toward Fame. The Kansas City Star, April 16, 1951.
Singer, Betty. Personal communications, including many photographs of the city, and newspaper articles on a variety of topics, including descriptions of Ku Klux Klan activities in the Sedalia area.
Venice, California in 1951.
Alexander, Carolyn Elayne. Images of America: Venice. Arcadia Publishing, Charleston, SC, 2004.
Hanney, Dolores. Venice, California. A Centennial Commemorative In Postcards. Center for American Places, Santa Fe, NM, 2005.
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