Max Franklin Hunter (July 2, 1921November 6, 1999) was an American

folklorist Folklore studies (also known as folkloristics, tradition studies or folk life studies in the UK) is the academic discipline devoted to the study of folklore. This term, along with its synonyms, gained currency in the 1950s to distinguish the ac ...

who, while working as a travelling salesman, compiled an archive of nearly 1,600

folk songs Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has be ...

from the

Ozarks The Ozarks, also known as the Ozark Mountains, Ozark Highlands or Ozark Plateau, is a physiographic region in the U.S. states of Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, as well as a small area in the southeastern corner of Kansas. The Ozarks cover ...

region of the southern United States between 1956 and 1976.

Life and career

Hunter was born on July 2, 1921, to a family with deep roots in the

. He grew up in

Springfield, Missouri Springfield is the List of cities in Missouri, third most populous city in the U.S. state of Missouri and the county seat of Greene County, Missouri, Greene County. The city's population was 169,176 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 censu ...

, attending

Baptist Baptists are a Christian denomination, denomination within Protestant Christianity distinguished by baptizing only professing Christian believers (believer's baptism) and doing so by complete Immersion baptism, immersion. Baptist churches ge ...

and

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

church services and singing with his family. He married Virginia Mercer in 1939 and started working for her father as a

refrigerator A refrigerator, commonly shortened to fridge, is a commercial and home appliance consisting of a thermal insulation, thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump (mechanical, electronic or chemical) that transfers heat from its inside to ...

salesman Sales are activities related to selling or the number of goods sold in a given targeted time period. The delivery of a service for a cost is also considered a sale. A period during which goods are sold for a reduced price may also be referred ...

. In 1952, he began working for the John Rhodes Refrigeration Supply Company, traveling on a 150-mile circuit through the Ozarks. During his travels, he began using a

tape recorder An audio tape recorder, also known as a tape deck, tape player or tape machine or simply a tape recorder, is a sound recording and reproduction device that records and plays back sounds usually using magnetic tape for storage. In its present ...

to record songs from people he met. At the Ozark Folk Festival circa 1956, he met folklorists

Vance Randolph Vance Randolph (February 23, 1892 – November 1, 1980) was a folklorist who studied the folklore of the Ozarks in particular. He wrote a number of books on the Ozarks, as well as '' Little Blue Books'' and juvenile fiction. Early life Randolph ...

and Mary Celestia Parler, who saw his potential as a collector and shared some basic archiving skills. Over his career, he recorded hundreds of singers, including

Almeda Riddle Almeda Riddle (November 21, 1898 – June 30, 1986) was an American folk singer. Born and raised in Cleburne County, Arkansas, she learned music from her father, a fiddler and a teacher of shape note singing. She collected and sang tradition ...

, Ollie Gilbert, Fred High, May Kennedy McCord, Raymond Sanders,

Jimmy Driftwood James Corbitt Morris (June 20, 1907 – July 12, 1998), known professionally as Jimmy Driftwood or Jimmie Driftwood, was an American folk music, folk-style songwriter and musician, most famous for his songs "The Battle of New Orleans (song), ...

, and others who were active in the

American folk music revival The American folk music revival began during the 1940s and peaked in popularity in the mid-1960s. Early folk music performers include Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Pete Seeger, Ewan MacColl (UK), Richard Dyer-Bennet, Oscar Brand, Jean Ritchie ...

movement. He sometimes went to great lengths to convince others to let him record them, such as by helping them out with chores, which at one point included delivering

moonshine Moonshine is alcohol proof, high-proof liquor, traditionally made or distributed alcohol law, illegally. The name was derived from a tradition of distilling the alcohol (drug), alcohol at night to avoid detection. In the first decades of the ...

. He also recorded by some estimates more than 14 hours of

joke A joke is a display of humour in which words are used within a specific and well-defined narrative structure to make people laugh and is usually not meant to be interpreted literally. It usually takes the form of a story, often with dialogue, ...

s and 1,100

proverb A proverb (from ) or an adage is a simple, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and are an example of formulaic speech, formulaic language. A proverbial phrase ...

s. Hunter was the last of the major Ozark ballad collectors, and defied the conventional wisdom of archivists at the time, who thought that such oral traditions had already been fully documented. His archival philosophy was to make absolutely no changes to the songs he collected, even to correct obvious errors. In 1972, he gave his audio tapes to the Springfield-Greene County Library, ignoring the advice of friends who urged him to give them to an academic institution where he worried the songs would get buried. From 1998 to 2001, the archive was

digitize Digitization is the process of converting information into a digital (i.e. computer-readable) format.Collins Dictionary. (n.d.). Definition of 'digitize'. Retrieved December 15, 2021, from https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/ ...

d by

Missouri State University Missouri State University (MSU or MO State), formerly Southwest Missouri State University, is a public university in Springfield, Missouri, United States. Founded in 1905 as the Fourth District Normal School, it is the state's second-largest u ...

. Many of his recordings are now on file at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

and other institutions. Although he quit smoking later in his life, he died of

emphysema Emphysema is any air-filled enlargement in the body's tissues. Most commonly emphysema refers to the permanent enlargement of air spaces (alveoli) in the lungs, and is also known as pulmonary emphysema. Emphysema is a lower respiratory tract di ...

on November 6, 1999, at the age of 78.

References

External links

Max Hunter Folk Song Collection at Missouri State University
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hunter, Max American folk-song collectors People from Springfield, Missouri 1921 births 1999 deaths 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American male writers

Life and career

See also

References

External links