A guitar enthusiast from Pennsylvania will donate a vintage guitar to Dockery Farms in Cleveland this week to give visitors an example of what pioneering Delta blues musicians played.
The instrument is the type made by the Dobro company in the late 1920s and early 1930s and used by musicians such as Charlie Patton. Jim Singleton of York, Pa., acquired it.
Singleton said a small ceremony would be held for the presentation of the guitar, although no date or time had been selected as of Thursday.
Singleton said he visited the site a month or two ago with friend Bernie Marsden, a founding member of the band Whitesnake.
“We were passing through that area and just stopped to soak it in,” he said. “We’re both musicians and have been lifelong players and blues aficionados, so to us, Dockery Farms is pretty much the center of American music.”
In addition to Patton, musicians who played and developed their styles around Dockery included Henry Sloan, Son House, Robert Johnson, Howlin’ Wolf, Pops Staples and Honeyboy Edwards.
While Singleton and Marsden were there, they met William Lester, executive director of the Dockery Farms Foundation, who gave them a tour and shared anecdotes about the place, which is on Highway 8.
During their conversation, Lester mentioned he was looking for an early-1930s steel-bodied resonator guitar made by Dobro to display at Dockery. The site is being remodeled, and displays are being added for visitors to see.
“As well as being a musician, my business is buying and selling vintage guitars,” Singleton said. “And I figured, ‘What a good cause to participate in,’ and off I went to find him one.”
These guitars provided more volume, and blues musicians liked them because “when they’re playing in a noisy juke joint or whatever, they could be heard over the crowd,” Singleton said.
In fact, the only known photograph of Patton shows him playing a guitar of a similar type and year.
It took a while to find what they were looking for, but a friend of Singleton’s from Asheville, N.C., located one and brought it to him at a guitar show in Philadelphia. Singleton estimated that its average retail value would be $3,500 to $4,500 now — and it’s still playable. “It’s traveled around and kind of beat up, but that’s exactly what he was looking for,” he said.
Singleton’s family is from Dumas, Ark., about 40 miles from the Clarksdale area. Growing up in the 1950s, he remembers listening the radio at night and developing a love for blues and country music.
He has been working with vintage guitars since 1973. For years, he worked in the heating and air conditioning business while also running his own shop, Jim’s Guitars, and traveling around the country for guitar shows. Once his children were grown, he went into the guitar business full-time.
He has been working with Marsden on a documentary about Clarksdale that Marsden plans to shop to the BBC. It includes interviews with musicians and a live performance at Ground Zero Blues Club as well as some material shot in England. Marsden, who lives near London, narrates and hosts most of it.
Singleton said he was grateful to Lester for sharing his knowledge about Dockery. He said he was pleasantly surprised that Lester was so willing to help two strangers who had shown up unannounced, but he could see how devoted he is to telling Dockery’s story.
“It’s a fantastic honor for me to be involved with it,” he said.
- Contact David Monroe at 581-7236 or dmonroe@
gwcommonwealth.com.
