A 78rpm Recording of Vernon Dalhart, The First Million Selling Country Music Artist

A couple of months ago we had a guy come in with a bunch of old 78rpm records. I was not real thrilled with them. I had went through and looked at a few of them and what I saw was fairly unimpressive. We finally decided to go ahead and get them.  I tossed them into the back room and they sat on top of my pottery work area for about a month or so.  Last Sunday I decided I was going to work on a new piece of pottery and so I had to clean off the work area. I looked through the 78's and found that there were a number of early thick two sided Edison records that were rather interesting. two of them were by Vernon Dalhart. I was rather surprised. I have loved Vernon Dalhart's music since I was a kid. To explain, when I was about 10 years old I started picking up 78's for between twenty five cents and a dollar at local junk shops and flea markets in Maryland and Virginia. By the time was sixteen or so, I had a pretty big collection of everything from Vernon Dalhart To Spike Jones. I spent a good portion of my youth listening to a lot of pre 1950's music. I went online to look and see if there was any information available about Vernon Dalhart. I was shocked to see that there was a ton of information on line about Vernon Dalhart! 

A Rare Image of Marion Try Slaughter aka Vernon Dalhart
1883-1948

Vernon Dalhart was born in 1883 in Jefferson, Texas. his birth name was Marion Try Slaughter.
Vernon Dalhart is considered the first superstar of country music. Before he recorded country music he worked as a cowboy, did opera in New York City, and did all types of popular music. He recorded over 1600 songs from 1916 to 1939. he also recorded a vast number of songs using different aliases. His lifetime recording sales are estimated at 70 million copies! Dalhart recorded many legendary country songs that have been listened to and loved by millions for over seventy five years now!
Here are a few of his songs that are available on YouTube.
I was totally shocked to see how many of his songs are on Youtube!

The Prisoner's Song 1925
Wreck of the Old 97 1924
The Runaway Train 1931
This is one of the recordings that we have at South Coast Antiques. Our 78rpm record is circa early 1920's or a bit before.
The Little Rosewood Casket

Vernon Dalhart passed from this world on September. 14, 1948.
One can virtually visit Vernon Dalhart's grave site in Mountain Grove Cemetery,
Bridgeport, Connecticut, USA.

If you would like to hear an outstanding collection of original Edison cylinder recordings of Vernon Dalhart (that can be downloaded in Mp3 format) and a vast number of other early recording artist go to University of California, Santa Barbara Library's Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project.

For more info on 78rpm records in general go to 78rpmrecord.com

As an ending note. Most 78rpm records and even a fair number of the early wax cylinders are very inexpensive and are  moderately easy to obtain.  They can be found at antique shops, flea markets, thrift shops and even on line. Always look for the ones in the very best condition. Do not let people tell you that these old records are supposed to be all scratchy and sound bad. Most of these recordings sounded just beautiful when they were new and in better condition and with proper play back will still sound great.