[McMURTRY, Larry (1936-2021), his copy]. LOMAX, John A. and Alan, editors. Negro Folk Songs as Sung by Lead Belly. “King of the Twelve-String Guitar Players of the World,” Long-Time Convict in the Penitentiaries of Texas and Louisiana. New York: Macmillan Company, 1936.
Large 8vo. Photographic frontispiece. Original tan buckram lettered in red-orange (black top stain faded away, spine sunned, some darkening at extremes, light dampstaining near top margins, pp. 198-215 upper margins affected the most with moderate mildew). Provenance: Larry McMurtry (his bookplate, which he designed, features the horseshoe-shaped brand his father and grandfather used on the McMurtry cattle), from his personal library at his home in Archer City; ownership signature of “Jeannie and Bill S.” on ffep verso.
FIRST EDITION, INSCRIBED BY HUDDIE LEDBETTER to his friends Marge and(?) Lewis. This work brought blues and folk musician Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter (1888-1949) to fame, having first been discovered by father-and-son folklorists John and Alan Lomax at Louisiana’s Angola Prison Farm in the summer of 1933.