STEVE WILLIAMS COLLECTION
Steve Williams is a long time Wray fan, having grown up in the Washington DC area. Here is a few items from his Wray Family collection. Thanks to Steve for allowing us to display some of his gems!
Here's a letter I got from Milt Cooper ("Grant") which is neat just for the stationery and his signature -- the same he used on the title of his daily TV show out of WTTG. Link played there (to a recording) a few times, and Ray Vernon I remember seeing doing his "My Sugar Plum" ( music track retitled "Big City Stomp" on the flip side of "Poppin' Popeye" some years later on his own Vermillion label).
A fellow friend of mine was a "regular" on the Milt Grant Show - he still has fond memories of going all the way from Alexandria to D.C. just to dance on TV. In those days, segregation mandated a separate afternoon of dancing for black kids about once a week. Milt seemed to take to both crowds equally well, to his credit. He used to use a Duke Ellington tune as theme music for his show, but damned if I can remember the title.
I can't seem to find the first column of this article from 1971 - I'll send it if I come across it. You can get it through the electronic archives of the Post, I imagine. The photo of Link uncharacteristically holding a Telecaster is worth the scan in itself. Steve Verrocca's comments about this being "music of the people" with "burping" and other less acceptable physical emanations being audible has to be one of the great pieces of artistic criticism of the 20th century. I'm glad I didn't squander my youth hanging around with a bunch of rednecks!
These cards were in my wallet for years. The top card was printed by Jack Van Horn himself in print shop at W & L High School in Arlington, Va., in 1960.
The middle card was our group at U. Va. in 1964, before Ed dropped out and got drafted. The third member of our Charlottesville group was Mike Viehmann, an organist who was with a very talented Northern Virginia group, the Partymakers, for many years. He, too, was a student then at the U.
The last card is self-explanatory.
items courtesy of Steve Williams