Title: Ed Ward Collection
Predominant Dates:1937-1991
Primary Creator: Ward, Ed
Extent: 4.0 Boxes (General)
Subjects: Country music -- History., Folk music., Harlan County (Ky.).
Languages: English
Ed Ward was a private record and tape collector, poet, prose writer, and community historian who lived at Bledsoe in Harlan County, Kentucky.
The digitized material in this collection includes recordings of interviews with Ed Ward, his reading from his writings such as Tall Tales of the Hills, musician interviews he recorded, and selected tape copies from Ward’s record collection of commercial recordings of Kentucky old time and early country music artists.
The collection’s interviews and music performances document such historically significant Kentucky old time musicians as Blind Dick Burnett, John V. Walker, Arthur Johnson, Ernest Martin, W.L. Gregory, the Jones Creek Quartet, and others including the widow of Blind James Howard whose ballads and fiddle tunes were recorded for the Library of Congress in 1937.
The substantial portion of the collection that is not yet digitized is comprised of taped copies of several dozen 78 rpm discs that document many lesser known traditional recording artists of the 1920s and 1930s representing areas beyond Kentucky. These recordings can be accessed in the Special Collections reading room.
Repository: Berea College Special Collections and Archives Catalog
Access Restrictions: Records can be accessed through the Reading Room, Berea College Special Collections and Archives, Hutchins Library, Berea College. Some recordings are available online.
Use Restrictions: There are no restrictions on use of this material other than federal copyright regulations.
Acquisition Source: Ed Ward donated the collection to the Berea College Special Collections and Archives.
Preferred Citation: [Object identification], Ed Ward Collection, Berea College Special Collections and Archives, Berea, KY.
Processing Information: The collection was arranged by Harry Rice, Sound Archivist. The finding aid was created in August 2015 by Collections Archivist, Lori Myers-Steele, and Harry Rice. Links to digital recordings added 2019.
Other Note: Collection Number: BCA 0137 SAA 137
