Elsewhere John M has been doing herculean work in bringing to our attention the wonderful lyricism of Sylvester Weaver. I thought I'd post here how Paul Garon tracked down Weaver's "scrapbook". The following is the introduction by Garon to "Kentucky Blues. Pt 2: The Sylvester Weaver Scrapbook." (Living Blues 52, Spring 1982, p 15-25)
On The Trail of SYLVESTER WEAVER
By 1960 I was nearly 20 years old, and I had lived in Louisville, Ky., all my life. My interest in blues had already been stirred, and I was quickly reaching the stage where I thought of little else. It was around that time that I received a helpful and providential letter from Paul Oliver. Did I know a Lemon family in Louisville? It was said that Sylvester Weaver worked, or had worked, for them. My first piece of fieldwork started that day; I wrapped it up 16 years later.
There were a number of Lemon families in Louisville, but only one that might have been called the Lemon family; they knew nothing. None of the other Lemon families knew anything about Sylvester Weaver either, and my first lead evaporated. But with the persistence of the truly obsessed, I kept asking my questions. Sylvester Weaver? Walter Beasley? Sara Martin?" No one had heard of Walter Beasley, few had heard of Sylvester Weaver, and none of these few knew anything about him, but I kept getting leads about Sara Martin. "She sings in the church now." "I saw her in Toronto about 10 years ago." "I don't think she's still in Louisville." And finally, "Sylvester Weaver? I think he's dead, but his wife Dorothy is still here somewhere. "
This led to a new line of inquiry, and I eventually located Dorothy Weaver's home/beauty shop in a rural suburb of east Louisville. For nearly a year, no one answered the door when I rang, but in early 1963, I had my first conversation with Dorothy Weaver. She identified herself as the widow and second wife of Sylvester Weaver, but she had been seriously ill; she didn't want to talk about anything for a while. I returned many times, usually getting no response to my knocking, occasionally being asked to leave by a gentleman who remained unidentified. Before I moved to Chicago in 1%7, Dorothy Weaver had come to the door a second time. "I have his records; I have all his records and his papers, too." But she wanted neither to sort them out nor sell them.
Whenever I returned to Louisville throughout the next seven or eight years, I knocked on Dorothy Weaver's door. She never answered again, and finally a neighbor told me she had moved to the West End; no forwarding address, no listing in the phone book; the trail was cold. In 1976 it warmed up again.
I was talking with some Louisville friends about how I'd found old 78's in Louisville, and I told them the Dorothy Weaver story (as it had come to be called). "Do you know Annie Jackson?" one asked. "She knows everybody in the West End." I called .Annie Jackson, and while she might not have known everybody in the West End, she certainly knew Dorothy Weaver, now Dorothy S.; she also knew her address and her telephone number. Best of all, she called Dorothy S. first and explained my mission to her in such a way that she agreed to see me. I called her immediately and set up an appointment for the next evening.
The next night, as I said hello to Mrs. S., I could hardly believe that 16 years of searching were going to finally come to an end. I first found out that Sylvester Weaver's musical career had ended well before he married his second wife, and she was unable to supply any details about that part of his life. But she did have his records, and his scrapbook! She agreed to sell me the records and all items in the scrapbook pertaining to his musical career. This business was quickly concluded, and for the benefit of the record collectors who are reading this, I will mention right away that the records that I found were not as exciting as they could have been. There were four Sylvester Weavers, three by Sara Martin (with Weaver), and five or six assorted blues. there were no great rarities, but they were nice records nonetheless.
The scrapbook was another story. The music items alone represented a veritable Sylvester Weaver archive, unparalleled in scope, as far as I know, by any such material bearing on the life of any one blues artist of Weaver's time. The archive gives most of us an unprecedented look at usually obscure aspects of the life and career of a major blues artist, and thus we have chosen to reproduce a number of the Weaver documents here. As usual with documents in or available to the archives maintained by Living Blues, all these materials are available for serious research.
NOTE: Dorothy S. asked that she not be mentioned by her married name if any part of our meeting was publicized.?Paul Garon
INVENTORY of the ARCHIVE Items Present
Telegrams from OKeh to Sylvester or Anna Weaver (1927) 4
Royalty statements from Clarence Williams Music Pub. Co. (1924-28) 9
Letters on letterhead from Clarence Williams Music Pub Co. (1924-25) 2
Letter to Sara Martin, on T.O.B.A. letterhead, from Sam E. Reevin, Treas. and Mgr. of T.O.B.A. ( 1925) I
Letters on letterhead from Eli Oberstein, T.C Rockwell and other OKeh personnel ( 1925-28) 9
Four-page handwritten letter to Sylvester Weaver from Helen Humes ( 1927) I
Short letter from Olivette Cannady (typist) to Sylvester Weaver ( 1928) I
Handwritten letter to Sylvester Weaver from J.C. Johnson (c. 1927) 1
Fragments of a letter to Sara Martin from Ralph Peer( 1924) 2
Advertisements from various newspapers for Weaver's and Martin's records including one picture of Sylvester Weaver and one of Sara Martin 8
Small advertisement cards, one for Sara Martin with her picture, and one for Butterbeans and Susie with their picture 2
Newsclipping on Sara Martin's wedding ( 1929) I
Newspaper review of vaudeville show at Lafayette Theater, N.Y., featuring Sara Martin and others (white acts as well as black, per forming for a black audience) (c. 1923) I
Four-page special Music Section of the Chicago Defender, 6/ 1/26, the section taken over entirely by OKeh, incl. another (different) photograph of Sylvester Weaver and photos of Lonnie Johnson, Hociel Thomas, Sara Martin, and others
Single sheet from the Chicago Defender of 12/19/25, with large OKeh Christmas advertisement featuring pictures of Weaver, Martin, Sippie Wallace, Laura Smith, Irene Scruggs, Virginia Liston, Clifford's Louisville Jug Band, Margaret Johnson, "Sloppy" Henry and others 1
Newsclipping on Mamie Smith's death ( 1946) I
Magazine article on Boogie Woogie by William Russell, with photo of Meade Lux Lewis I
On The Trail of SYLVESTER WEAVER
By 1960 I was nearly 20 years old, and I had lived in Louisville, Ky., all my life. My interest in blues had already been stirred, and I was quickly reaching the stage where I thought of little else. It was around that time that I received a helpful and providential letter from Paul Oliver. Did I know a Lemon family in Louisville? It was said that Sylvester Weaver worked, or had worked, for them. My first piece of fieldwork started that day; I wrapped it up 16 years later.
There were a number of Lemon families in Louisville, but only one that might have been called the Lemon family; they knew nothing. None of the other Lemon families knew anything about Sylvester Weaver either, and my first lead evaporated. But with the persistence of the truly obsessed, I kept asking my questions. Sylvester Weaver? Walter Beasley? Sara Martin?" No one had heard of Walter Beasley, few had heard of Sylvester Weaver, and none of these few knew anything about him, but I kept getting leads about Sara Martin. "She sings in the church now." "I saw her in Toronto about 10 years ago." "I don't think she's still in Louisville." And finally, "Sylvester Weaver? I think he's dead, but his wife Dorothy is still here somewhere. "
This led to a new line of inquiry, and I eventually located Dorothy Weaver's home/beauty shop in a rural suburb of east Louisville. For nearly a year, no one answered the door when I rang, but in early 1963, I had my first conversation with Dorothy Weaver. She identified herself as the widow and second wife of Sylvester Weaver, but she had been seriously ill; she didn't want to talk about anything for a while. I returned many times, usually getting no response to my knocking, occasionally being asked to leave by a gentleman who remained unidentified. Before I moved to Chicago in 1%7, Dorothy Weaver had come to the door a second time. "I have his records; I have all his records and his papers, too." But she wanted neither to sort them out nor sell them.
Whenever I returned to Louisville throughout the next seven or eight years, I knocked on Dorothy Weaver's door. She never answered again, and finally a neighbor told me she had moved to the West End; no forwarding address, no listing in the phone book; the trail was cold. In 1976 it warmed up again.
I was talking with some Louisville friends about how I'd found old 78's in Louisville, and I told them the Dorothy Weaver story (as it had come to be called). "Do you know Annie Jackson?" one asked. "She knows everybody in the West End." I called .Annie Jackson, and while she might not have known everybody in the West End, she certainly knew Dorothy Weaver, now Dorothy S.; she also knew her address and her telephone number. Best of all, she called Dorothy S. first and explained my mission to her in such a way that she agreed to see me. I called her immediately and set up an appointment for the next evening.
The next night, as I said hello to Mrs. S., I could hardly believe that 16 years of searching were going to finally come to an end. I first found out that Sylvester Weaver's musical career had ended well before he married his second wife, and she was unable to supply any details about that part of his life. But she did have his records, and his scrapbook! She agreed to sell me the records and all items in the scrapbook pertaining to his musical career. This business was quickly concluded, and for the benefit of the record collectors who are reading this, I will mention right away that the records that I found were not as exciting as they could have been. There were four Sylvester Weavers, three by Sara Martin (with Weaver), and five or six assorted blues. there were no great rarities, but they were nice records nonetheless.
The scrapbook was another story. The music items alone represented a veritable Sylvester Weaver archive, unparalleled in scope, as far as I know, by any such material bearing on the life of any one blues artist of Weaver's time. The archive gives most of us an unprecedented look at usually obscure aspects of the life and career of a major blues artist, and thus we have chosen to reproduce a number of the Weaver documents here. As usual with documents in or available to the archives maintained by Living Blues, all these materials are available for serious research.
NOTE: Dorothy S. asked that she not be mentioned by her married name if any part of our meeting was publicized.?Paul Garon
INVENTORY of the ARCHIVE Items Present
Telegrams from OKeh to Sylvester or Anna Weaver (1927) 4
Royalty statements from Clarence Williams Music Pub. Co. (1924-28) 9
Letters on letterhead from Clarence Williams Music Pub Co. (1924-25) 2
Letter to Sara Martin, on T.O.B.A. letterhead, from Sam E. Reevin, Treas. and Mgr. of T.O.B.A. ( 1925) I
Letters on letterhead from Eli Oberstein, T.C Rockwell and other OKeh personnel ( 1925-28) 9
Four-page handwritten letter to Sylvester Weaver from Helen Humes ( 1927) I
Short letter from Olivette Cannady (typist) to Sylvester Weaver ( 1928) I
Handwritten letter to Sylvester Weaver from J.C. Johnson (c. 1927) 1
Fragments of a letter to Sara Martin from Ralph Peer( 1924) 2
Advertisements from various newspapers for Weaver's and Martin's records including one picture of Sylvester Weaver and one of Sara Martin 8
Small advertisement cards, one for Sara Martin with her picture, and one for Butterbeans and Susie with their picture 2
Newsclipping on Sara Martin's wedding ( 1929) I
Newspaper review of vaudeville show at Lafayette Theater, N.Y., featuring Sara Martin and others (white acts as well as black, per forming for a black audience) (c. 1923) I
Four-page special Music Section of the Chicago Defender, 6/ 1/26, the section taken over entirely by OKeh, incl. another (different) photograph of Sylvester Weaver and photos of Lonnie Johnson, Hociel Thomas, Sara Martin, and others
Single sheet from the Chicago Defender of 12/19/25, with large OKeh Christmas advertisement featuring pictures of Weaver, Martin, Sippie Wallace, Laura Smith, Irene Scruggs, Virginia Liston, Clifford's Louisville Jug Band, Margaret Johnson, "Sloppy" Henry and others 1
Newsclipping on Mamie Smith's death ( 1946) I
Magazine article on Boogie Woogie by William Russell, with photo of Meade Lux Lewis I