James Charles Rodgers was born on September 8, 1897, and lived until May 26, 1933.
He was an American singer-songwriter and musician who rose to popularity in the late 1920s. Widely regarded as “the Father of Country Music”, he is best known for his distinctive rhythmic yodeling, unusual for a music star of his era.
Rodgers rose to prominence based upon his recordings, among country music’s earliest, rather than concert performances.
He has been cited as an inspiration by many artists and inductees into various halls of fame across both country music and the blues, in which he was also a pioneer. Among his other popular nicknames are “The Singing Brakeman” and “The Blue Yodeler”
Rodgers’ mother died when he was about six or seven years old, and Rodgers, the youngest of three sons, spent the next few years living with various relatives in southeast Mississippi and southwest Alabama, near Geiger. In the 1900 Census for Daleville, Lauderdale County, Mississippi,
Jimmie Rodgers’s parents: Meet Aaron Rodgers, Eliza Bozeman Rodgers
Jimmie’s mother, Eliza (Bozeman) Rodgers, was listed as already having had seven children, with four of them still living at that date.
Jimmie (called “James” in the census) was probably born sixth of the seven children. He eventually returned home to live with his father, Aaron Rodgers, a maintenance-of-way foreman on the Mobile and Ohio Railroad, who had settled with a new wife in Meridian.
