Here’s my entry on Rodgers in The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia:Rodgers, Jimmie [1897 - 1933]Jimmie Rodgers was born in Meridian, Mississippi on September 8, 1897, disproving General Sherman’s post-march announcement of the 1860s that ‘Meridian no longer exists!’ Rodgers, looking in his publicity pictures like a cross between Bing Crosby and Stan Laurel, was ‘the father of country music’ yet was mesmerised by the blues, a genre to which he contributed and with which he became familiar from working alongside black railroad labourers. Hence his other appellation, ‘the Singing Brakeman’.(The railroad line, and even the train, still runs through Meridian, which is built on a rise. The track crosses a wide street that climbs to tall, elderly buildings, some of which must have gone up during Jimmie’s childhood.)Rodgers, the inventor of the Blue Yodel, had a short life and a brief career. Continue reading →