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Part of this collection is stored offsite. Please make an appointment prior to visiting.
Researchers may access digitized materials by requesting to view the materials in person by appointment or remotely by contacting the West Virginia & Regional History Center reference department at https://westvirginia.libanswers.com/wvrhc.
Acquired from Chappell, Louis Watson, 1977/03/24
Gift of Chappell, Louis Watson, 1978/07/06.
Gift of Chappell, Louis Watson, 1987/08/05.
Gift of Dolive, Louis, 2010/03/01.
Louis Watson Chappell was born in Belvidere, North Carolina and educated in English Language and Literature at Wake Forest University (B.A.), and the University of Virginia (M.A.). Subsequent study was undertaken at Columbia University, the University of Chicago, and New York University. Receiving a faculty appointment at West Virginia University in 1922, Chappell embarked upon a career dedicated to documenting and preserving West Virginia's folk music, which proved to be highly significant. He began his study of traditional music a decade or so earlier as a ballad hunter in the North Carolina-Virginia tidewater region in which he had spent his youth. Some years later the results of his collecting in the area were published in a book entitled "Folk-Songs of Roanoke and the Albemarle" (Morgantown: Ballad Press, 1939). The folklorist's first major contribution to West Virginia folklore was an exhaustive investigation into the controversy surrounding the ballad "John Henry" and its distinction from "John Hardy." In 1933 the publication of a full-length study "John Henry: A Folk-Lore Study" (Jena. Frommansche Verlag) placed the celebrated steel driver at the Big Bend Tunnel in late 19th-century West Virginia. In 1937 Chappell purchased a disc recording machine similar to the one employed at the time by his colleague and friend, John A. Lomax.
[Description and date of item], [Box/folder number], Louis Watson Chappell (1890-1981), Folklorist, Research Papers, Sound Recordings, and Other Material, A&M 2480, West Virginia and Regional History Center, West Virginia University Libraries, Morgantown, West Virginia.
Collection referenced in West Virginia University, and John A. Cuthbert.
undated; 3 reels of microfilm; Transcriptions in musical notation of performances recorded and collected by Louis Watson Chappell of West Virginia folk musicians. The recordings from which these transcriptions were derived can be found in the folk music collection of the West Virginia and Regional History Center, in collection numbers 1-88 (see link to collection page in Instances).
1815-1980; 14 ft. 10 1/2 in. and 9 in. item (30 five in. document cases, 6 three in. flat storage boxes; seven 1 1/2 in. blue notebooks; Meissner Radio Phono Recorder [Model 9-1065]); The papers of Chappell contain correspondence, folk music and folklore research papers, and other material. The Chappell correspondence regards the collection of Appalachian folk music and the publication of his book "Traditional Songs of West Virginia". Folk music research papers include information regarding ballad texts, and transcriptions from field recordings he and others made of West Virginia folk musicians (including transcriptions in music notation of vocal and instrumental performances, and in text of ballad lyrics). Folklore includes superstitions, folk medicine, word origins, proverbs and sayings, place names, children's games and dances, riddles and jokes, folktales; and his research papers (notes and typescripts with handwritten corrections) regarding John Henry, a steel driver at the Big Bend railroad tunnel.
-1941; 1/4 in. (25 pages in 1 folder); Outgoing letters by Louis Watson Chappell to Fletcher Collins regarding folk song collection and publication.
319. JEANETTE SHULZ. Hundred, Wetzel County, WV, 27 March 1980.
An interview with Mrs. Shulz, daughter of Scott Phillips, conducted by John A. Cuthbert. Mrs. Shulz's gives her recollections of her father's musical activity -- stringbands, radio performances, and recordings made by L.W. Chappell. One reel (5") 3 3/4 ips, quality good. (R374)
In 1937, Chappell purchased a disc recording machine, and over the next eleven years amassed an archive of West Virginia folk music of more than 2000 items, performed by over 90 different people. Of particular interest are the twenty-five discs of the legendary fiddler Edwin "Edden" Hammons, who performed for Chappell in August, 1947.
These recordings have been digitized and may be accessed remotely or in person by appointment.
Separated to the Rare Book Collection:
Campbell, Dame Olive and Cecil J. Sharp, editors.
Bradbury, William B.
Brewster, Paul G.
Brown, Jessie H., Mattie M. Boteler, R. M. McIntosh, and H. R. Christie, editors.
Griggs, John, editor.
Hall, J. H. and J. H. Ruebush and E. T. Hildebrand.
Mason, Lowell and Timothy B. Mason.
Sargent, Child Helen and George Lyman Kittredge, editors.
Seward, Theodore, assisted by Dr. Lowell Mason and William B. Bradbury.
Thompson, Stith.
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