DeFord Bailey

The song that gave the Opry its name came from a train. Bailey's Pan American Blues, named for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad's Pan-American, was on the air on December 10, 1927, when George D. Hay remarked that after an hour of grand opera his listeners would now hear the Grand Ole Opry. Bailey's grandfather Lewis, a harmonica player, taught him Fox Chase. In 1928 he made the first recordings in Nashville, and RCA released his John Henry in both its race and its hillbilly catalogs, a sign of how the industry sorted him.

What the plaque says

Deford Bailey Born near the community of Bellwood, in the 1920s and 1930s, Deford Bailey won nationwide fame as "The harmonica Wizar." A founding member of The Grand Ole Opry, he was the first African-American to win fame in country music. Through his phonograph records and broadcasts, he took the fold music of his rural family and community o a national audience. His famous harmonica solos, such as "Pan American Blues" and "Fox Chase," are recognized as folk music masterpieces.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Wynnewood State Historic Site — 15 mi
  A National Historic Landmark log inn at the Bledsoe's Lick springs, beside a Mississippian mound center and tied to the domestic slave trade.
• Red Boiling Springs — 25 mi
  A Macon County spa town built around red sulphur springs, with five kinds of mineral water, red-painted pumps and the surviving hotels of a resort that once held more than a dozen.

More markers nearby

• William Haskell Neal — 4.3 mi
• Tilman Dixon — 8.4 mi
• The James DeBow Home — 9.2 mi
• James E. Ward — 9.3 mi