The Tale of Milo and Rega

  In the last post I hinted at what I'd be writing for this one, and I will do so. 

I never thought I'd have the privilege to go through the prized photographs and papers Justin Ring kept, and after being able to do so, not a lot of what was there was quite surprising. Hager is an essential part of Ring's story, and this has become even clearer after seeing all this stuff. 

Two posts ago I quoted Ring's late-in-life essay, "Gift of Love", more specifically the portion where he mentions Hager, just as a refresher, I will quote it again to start this look into their relationship though photographs. 

Here is what he said of Hager throughout the essay: 

"I continued to play at Ebling's Casino where I met Fred Hager, another musician who was to play a very important role in my future life. Fred played violin. Some nights after work[the recording labs] we would gather the boys for a jam session and they would not go home until morning. 

...

In the summer of 1904[probably a few years earlier] Fred Hager, the promoter, I called him, decided to try the record business which was just coming into being...I saw Fred from time to time as he progressed in his song business. Each time we met, he would try to get me to come in with him and start a recording company."

And that is all he said about Hager. 

Despite it being rather minimal, it is essential to understanding their story. As with Hager's side of the story, Ring also downplayed the closeness of their relationship. He writes about Hager in a way that only suggests a business partnership, but the mere mention of him in this essay is noteworthy. The fact that he takes up almost an entire page on Hager speaks volumes. Ring wrote this essay to tell his story through only his family, yet he takes up significant space for Hager, who wasn't blood related. He didn't grow up with Hager. They would have met, based on Hager's writing(quoted two posts ago), at the end of 1898 or very early 1899. 

(Ring, c.1897, photo courtesy of Tricia Wentz SirLouis)

Ring was 22--going on 23, an assistant to the New York philharmonic, sent to work in the amateur cabaret halls of the lower east side. he had also much potential, and by that time it was likely that he was acquainted with the phonograph. he also likely knew musicians like Frank P. Banta and Edward Issler, who were prominent early members of the new musician's union(0f which Ring was one of the youngest members). It must have caught him off guard to suddenly feel a delicate hand on his back that one night at the casino. 

(Hager, around the time he met Ring)

Hager was 24, just married, and right out of music school. He was looking for talent, as he was assigned by Frank Seaman and the other founders of the Zon-O-Phone to pluck musicians out of their dives and put them into an orchestra he had been forming since at least 1896. He was considered the youngest competent bandleader at the time. He was just kicking around all the dives on the east side, and he just happened to come into Ebling's, likely for some nice dinner and entertainment---and there he was. 

Clearly there was something about that pianist, something about him was different than the other accompanists he knew(like Fred Hylands and Frank P. Banta). His attack was intense but somehow controlled. He could listen but also add on to the accompaniments perfectly. Something was special about him. 

From that moment that Hager came up to him, both of their paths changed forever. The long nights of jam sessions must have gone over well, and stuck so fondly in their hearts that the records they made proved to be exceptional. So much so that Hager kept his write up on them in his scrapbook until he died. Whatever it was between them, that at this point seems very likely to be more than professional as Ring implied, it blossomed in 1901 and 1902. Their relationship was so close and seemingly intimate by the middle of 1902 that they decided to take a few pictures together at a photographer a few blocks down from the Columbia lab. These pictures were so dear to both of them, they they both kept copies of them until they both died. 

Remember this picture? Well, the copy you are seeing here is the one that Ring kept for decades. 

On that same day, they took a few more pictures together, but only two 0f them survive. Ring kept another of the two of them that seems more intimate than the one above. 

 (The writing on the print is Ring's)

I nearly cried upon first seeing this picture. It is so perfect-- it captured their personalities quite well. Another thing I noticed about the picture just above is that they have matching collars and shirts. It is also rather uncommon to see the two of them looking right at the viewer, as the both of them were rather awkward in different ways. Ring's eyes were very bright(difficult to photograph correctly) and he was generally a bit reserved and awkward. Hager's eyes were uneven and the composition of his social skills was questionable. 

Based on the timing of these pictures, they were taken at what I've observed was the zenith of their relationship. They were writing many songs together, working together everyday in more than one recording lab, and spending weeks living together writing and publishing their own music. As Ring said in his essay, "life was good to me" and that it seems in this case.

With Hager gaining more success in the publishing and recording world, he could bring Ring up with him, and that is exactly what he did. They were promoted to publishing with a larger firm in the middle of 1902. This is where Ring's name for Hager, "The promoter" comes into play. Thanks to Ring being brought up as musical nobility, he hadn't much need to push his own talents to others, so such aggressive hustling wasn't part of his nature or vocabulary. If Hager was good at anything, it was his hustling skills. He got to where he was through charisma and manipulation. He wasn't necessarily the best musician, and a decent composer, but his true forte remained in his expert manipulation to rise up the musical food chain. This is also where the term "inseparable" could be implemented with their relationship. As Hager rose up and gathered all the recording lab contracts he could, he took Justus with him no matter what. It was guarantee that blond headed blue eyed Justus would be by his side, and everyone was becoming familiar with this. Naturally, their fellow orchestra men came to know this sooner than the other Tin Pan Alley writers. 

(half of Hager's orchestra, 1902)

"Inseparable" is how Jim Walsh described Ring and Hager in 1962, just weeks before Ring died. I still have yet to know whether it was Ring or Hager who described their relationship in that way to Walsh. After poking through both of what remains of their papers, it is difficult to tell which of them said the word. No matter who said it, they both handled the relationship very differently, and it impacted how they lived for decades. 

When Hager met Ring, he had been married since the end of 1897, and he had one daughter by early 1899. He was a respectable young father, with seemingly no funny business going on, and an already successful career. In mid 1900, his second daughter Florence was born, and by then it seemed he had cemented his normal family life, but something wasn't right. He was spending most of his time at two recording labs, and he was getting to know this mysterious Justus Ringleben. By the middle of 1902, Hager was spending barely any time with his wife and kids. He lived days and weeks at a time with Ring, who at this time wasn't married. These good times with Ring proved to be consequential in the years to come, as Hager's older daughters wanted nothing to do with their father's legacy. It was because of the youngest daughter Ethel that any of Hager's papers survive. Ethel was born after all the initial funny business with Ring had passed(late 1905). She got to see her father much more than Clara and Florence had. Hager made sure to pay much more attention to Ethel, as he wrote many child-themed and novelty pieces when she was growing up. When his daughters were in their teen's all three of them left the house for substantial jobs, giving Fred more time at work and more time with Ring of course. 

Amid some recent research, I realized that Ring and Hager may have reunited in the early 1910's. Ring married in 1909, and spent a few years out of sight of his old friends, occasionally writing songs with Ed Farran and making some records with Eddie King, but more often he was spending time getting to know his in-laws. His in-laws, the Patz family, lived in Fitchburg Massachusetts, and old father Gustav had been in the Boston symphony for years by then. He went to visit the in-laws often when he was getting to know Elsie better, likely spending holidays with them in Boston. 

(Elsie with her parents, sister, nephew, niece, and her daughter Vera, its likely that Ring took the picture. taken c.1911)

On these trips to visit the in-laws, Ring likely set aside some time to visit Hager at the phono-cut lab, or socialize with the Boston Symphony musicians that Hager hired to make records. 

After the Phono-cut disbanded, Ring spent more time with his wife, kid, and dog. He probably had little to do with Hager's operation at Rex, therefore not meeting up with him again until at least 1916. 

They were back together when the Okeh company was founded in 1918, and this time it seems they were going to stay together. The novelty and nostalgia of their time together nearly two decades before must have been part of the reason they got back together so quickly. Just as before, they were writing music and arrangements once again. Hager also had quite a good amount of disposable income at the time, so he had the bright idea to buy a very expensive motorboat. The first boat he purchased didn't work out so well:

 Well after almost killing all the Okeh management, he decided to get another one, as he apparently had the money to do so. 

He kept the second boat for much longer than the first. According to a 1936 local paper article, Hager named this boat Kathryn. Why? I do not know. Ring seemed to enjoy Hager's boat, as within the dozens of photos Ring kept, there were a few of them on that second boat. 

Never have I seen such a happy Ring. 

But of course, there's one picture that sums up everything I've said about them, and it seems quite fitting that it was taken on Hager's boat. 

Yes indeed folks. 
That's Ring and Hager out at sea in what looks like the middle 1920's. It's difficult to date, but it looks to be from before 1930. There's so much about this picture that is informative to their characters and relationship. Hager is wearing actual shorts, and Ring is wearing linen trousers neatly cuffed. They are wearing matching shirts, as I mentioned in the earlier part of this post with that other picture. Hager really looks like an old burnt out executive, but Ring happily has some life in him. There are so many little nuances about this picture that are important to note. Being an artist, this picture helps me understand a lot more about how they looked, from Hager's rounded shoulders to Ring's gentle but sturdy hands. Never have I laughed so much with joy about a picture as I did upon seeing this one. I am so grateful that Ring kept this picture, and that his descendants kept it intact. 

Anyhow, they remained close into the 1930's and 40's, continuing to write music together. They both headed to work on radio shows in the 1930's, as Hager wrote to a local reporter in 1936. Hager, being always ambitious and energetic, slipped on ice and broke his ankle in early 1936. Here is the local write up on it: 

Funny stuff. 
So of course with Ring's kind heart, he had the courtesy to come and visit Hager while he was stuck in bed. Justy as Hager called him. Even at age 60, they still cared for each other greatly. 

They wrote lots of music together in the 1940's, but after the war they both took some form of retirement. Ring officially retired around 1947, but Hager kept going with his paperwork in publishing into the 1950's. Being contacted by Jim Walsh reinvigorated old man Hager, and it might have done so for Ring a bit, but he was reluctant to attend the gatherings that Walsh and John Bieling hosted. Hager told perhaps hundreds of stories to Walsh and other young collectors at the time, and all he wanted to do was give them things from his past. Ring may have given Walsh a few things, but we have yet to find out exactly what he was willing to tell to Walsh, and if Ring even wrote back. 

They may have been split at Hager's death in 1958, but their time together remains set in stone by the many photos that Ring and his loving descendants preserved for decades. So that's the tale of Milo and Rega. 

Whew! Honestly I never thought I'd be able to tell their story in a way such as this. It seems much clearer now after thoroughly examining both their papers. Oddly enough, Ring's papers seem more complete than Hager's, though Hager's may have been extensive at one time. 

I know I promised I'd get back into some more of my new records in this post, So I'll post a few links to crappy transfers I did of the ones I didn't in the last post. 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1H-Pp9dCyofDAepn2VBIlhmSY75y_J7kp/view?usp=sharing

This one is "uncle Jefferson" by Arthur Collins and Ring on a Zon-O-phone. For years I've had a transfer of this record for its phenomenal accompaniment, but never would I have dreamt I'd have such a pristine copy. 

Any version of this song is good to me, so naturally a Collins version is just as good as any of Billy Golden's. I appreciate that Ring played his accompaniment in a way that slightly imitates how Fred Hylands played it. Just to get the point across, here's Golden's 1897 Columbia of it with Hylands:

http://cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/search.php?queryType=@attr+1=1020&num=1&start=1&query=cylinder11728

This record here is still one of the best concrete examples of rag-time in its earliest form. It's rare that we can hear real live syncopation as it was actually played, and this record shows it to us clear as a bell. 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/19c5lO-VjPrWP84MWdxXKWR_CCwInVCfa/view?usp=sharing

I heard a Climax record of this piece last year and fell in love with it. I was hoping to come across a copy of that very Climax record someday, but this great little 7 incher will suffice for the moment. 

It features some classic very expressive and slightly frivolous Hylands accompaniment. Such is always welcome to my regular listening. It's quite unassuming, and I haven't much to say about it, as it's just a great record. 

Anyhow, I'll have to end it off here, just so the post isn't too long. I've also exhausted a lot of information and mind power on this post. Believe it or not, I actually have another topic in the pipeline for the next post, as I have been getting into more percussion on early disc records. In the next post I'll be exploring the bass drum effect on early discs and the connections between Frank P. Banta and trombonist Arthur Pryor, stay tuned! 

Hope you enjoyed this! 

"The Gift of Love"

 In the last few weeks, it has been a busy time for me in terms of research. After several years of dead ends with Justin Ring, I decided to do something about it and contact his family. more recently(this week) I have been helping clean out a collector's house, which means I have been acquiring lots of new records. So far there's been lots of good stuff coming in, and within the next week or so I should be getting my Nauck auction winnings. 

So, regarding Ring...It seems that jumping into this project head on was a good idea. Before the last few weeks, it had been nearly impossible too find any decent information on Ring from period sources. 

Finding any mention of him not pertaining to recording or publishing is nearly impossible, but thanks to his descendants, I am finally getting a better idea of who he really was outside of his work. This project is still a work in progress, so I haven't made any serious conclusions yet, but it seems important enough to share pieces of an essay that Ring wrote later in his life. 

I have Hager's papers(or what's left of them), and from what he kept, Ring was an important figure in his life. Hager wanted to write several volumes of the life he lived in recording, as he expressed so aggressively to Jim Walsh. He never got to writing such these volumes, but I have small pieces that would have gone into these. He loved talking about his past, as he knew that he was an important figure in the music business for several decades. Naturally, if he told this story, his own words would be only half of the tale. The other half would go to Ring. 

Hager's story would be incomplete without Ring, and Rings's the same without Hager. It seems quite evident that they were indeed inseparable as Jim Walsh put it in 1962. After reading a few pages of Ring's writing, it is clear that he was a gifted storyteller, more so than his own beloved lyricists. 

There is this one 6 page essay written by Ring, and it is titled "The Gift of Love". he wrote this late in his life intended for future curious generations of his family. Ring became a family man, and dearly cared for his children and grandchildren. His daughter Marion(born 1919) was the family historian, as she did as much as she could to preserve her father's legacy. Ring wrote this for Marion, and it reads a lot like a grandfather telling tales to his grandchildren, of course in the best way possible. There isn't any specific organization to the essay, as he jumps around to different dates. I am still trying to figure out all the timing of the events he speaks of. 

There are several priceless anecdotes in this essay, one of the recurring jokes is little Ring grabbing a bunch of candies from a large jar on the counter. So it turns out that Ring's father, Justus Ringleben sr., opened a candy shop when he retired around 1880. They moved to that building that I visited back in January, and set up a candy store on the front below. So Ring would grab candies whenever father wasn't looking. In one of the stories he mentions that his father said:

"You are eating up all the profits again, off to school with you." 

This joke comes up a bunch of times. 

So for my regular readers here, you're probably wondering where Hager comes into the picture. So, here's the thing about that...He is prominently mentioned. The way he is spoken of and how he is mentioned is actually curious when looking at it from an analytical standpoint. Ring's organization in this essay is a little anachronistic, making it difficult to know where the stories are going and to keep track. But one thing that is very important about his language is how exactly he tells the story of his young life. 

He stopped the story in 1908 when he married his second wife Elsie, to whom he was married until 1959. So thankfully we don't get any of his later work confused with the early stuff(though he does mention working for Okeh and Decca). this document was written exclusively for his family, and the way he tells his story is through his close family. Practically nobody else outside of his own family is explicitly named or detailed...

except Hager. 

The only person he mentions outside of his family is Hager. This certainly doesn't come as a surprise, but considering the circumstances of the paper it is still rather curious. Yes, he mentions Hager, but the real question is how Ring spoke of him. Before reading this essay, I thought almost certainly that Ring was reluctant to speak of Hager to anyone, especially of that time between 1900 and 1904. So here's what he says about Hager: 

At that time there wasn't any musicians union so I joined Samuel Gompers who was very active in the cigar makers union. A few years later, I became a charter member of Local #802 of the Musicians Union. I continued to play at Ebling's Casino where I met Fred Hager, another musician who was to play a very important part in my future life. Fred played violin. Some nights after work we would gather the boys for a jam session and they would not go home until morning. 

In the summer of 1904 Fred Hager, the promoter, I called him, decided to try the record business which was then coming into being. I started composing in my spare time. I saw Fred from time to time as he progressed in his song business. Each time we met, he could try to get me to come in with him to start a recording company. I eventually did and before I knew it, I was the recording manager of Okeh records...

There you have it folks, his own words on Hager. So, there's a lot to take in here. He jumps all over the place in years, and a few things are a bit out of order, but based on what we know about him and Hager, we can pull it apart and set some dates to a sort of timeline. He doesn't give any specifics on when he met Hager, but he mentioned the Casino gig he had on the previous page, so I would put his employment there around 1897-1899. Hager began making records in the middle of 1898, and in early 1899 Frank Seaman and the Universal record company sent him out to pick up talent to record. Hager wrote this up in his own little essay like Ring's, in fact here's a piece from it: 

The following winter[1899] I was engaged by an inventor of a new type of disc records called the Zon-O-Phone and supplied him with various singers [and] instrumental singers[sic] for experimental players. I continued my band concerts for a number of seasons and after I finished my contract with Zon-O-Phone, my band was engaged for both the Edison and Columbia and I had earned the name of the record talent pioneer. 

*lots of mistakes and poorly typed words on this sheet from Hager's papers, I had difficulty writing it out to be as legible as possible. I'm sitting here with a headache staring at this faint typewriting trying to transcribe this damn thing*

So Hager claims that he went out and picked up a lot of that strange talent that recorded on Zono only in 1900 and 1901, and this is one of the few things we can be sure that he did. So comparing it with Ring's writing, it would seem that Ring was one of Hager's *discoveries* while running around the dives and vaudeville houses.  Hager must have gone around to nearly every place he could hear unusual talent, and I guess that this talent would include a willing accompanist for the new Zon-O-phone. 

(one of the first Zono ads to be used, from around February of 1899, taken from The Phonoscope)

The Zono crowd was eager for talent and investors, and with Hager's help, they were able to get what they needed by the end of 1900, and with their credibility growing quickly, big investors like Eldridge R. Johnson bought some of their stock.

So from what Ring stated, Hager picked him out from among many amateur performers, but it just so happened there was an immediate deeper connection between the two of them. he speaks about Hager as highly and as lovingly as he does the rest of his own family, more so than his own wife Elsie. Clearly Hager was family to Ring, whether his family liked it or not. Hager was really special to him, so much so that he'd speak of it so plainly to his daughters and grandchildren. Oddly enough, there is little mention of Ring in what remains of Hager's papers, though the full page portrait of Ring speaks volumes. 

This one: 

 I have yet to find out whether Ring kept a nice portrait of Hager in his own papers, but there's a chance he did.. 
 

Overall, in Ring's essay, he mentions little about his early days in recording, which is a little frustrating, but doesn't hinder me much. Before I move on to another small thing, I would like to acknowledge a curious line from his essay, one that is stated rather out of context. 

Life was good to me...

How it's written above is just about as out of context as it is in the actual essay. As a very particular researcher, I am intrigued by this line. It could mean a lot, though in this context I can see it more as an acknowledgement of how he was lucky to have been loved and adored by so many lovely people. With that, it seems really sweet and humble. Considering how much he did in his life, he spoke very little of how he actually was and things directly related to himself, unlike with Hager. he genuinely seems like a kind old man with many fantastic stories to tell, far more than those that he wrote about here.

See here's the catch...Ring would be perfectly willing to speak of his past, but only if you were family. Based on what I've seen here, he was somewhat reluctant to speak to Jim Walsh about his past. He cared so much for his family, because they understood him and loved him dearly. Some things about his past seemed that they wouldn't fare well written down by Walsh in articles. Ring was perfectly happy to keep the beloved stories he had within the family, not out in the open for all collectors to see. After reading this, there's definitely a deeper story between Ring and Hager, and my previous posts regarding the closeness of their relationship hold up. 

Before I close out, I'd like to address something else regarding Ring that folks have been asking me about. A little while ago, a few comments were thrown on here on Ring being an accomplished clarinetist. At first I was skeptical of this, as he was known for his record accompaniments and composing, and I had not seen any writings on him regarding woodwinds. So it seems that this was indeed true. he played clarinet and saxophone, along with everything else he played on records for Okeh and victor. His descendants are still quite musical, and it seems that a few play reed instruments! This actually does explain why Ring and Hager wrote so many pieces in the 20's that were intended for saxophone. 

In 1900 on Zon-O-Phone, a groups called the Zonophone reed orchestra made a few records. So it seems pretty certain who came up with this idea---Ring. 

Here's an example of one of these records: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52dqvBYYo7M 

I just won a copy of one of these records, and should get it in the mail soon! Will definitely post about it when it comes. 

So there's this famous picture of what is the Edison Military band, taken around 1907. They're in the recording lab, all crowded together around the horn, with a whiskered conductor behind it. For years I had no idea who any of these musicians were, and just on a whim I went back and looked at it last week. I listened to a few Edison military band records, and remembered that there was a sax in that group. Upon inspecting the picture again, it hit me. 

That's Ring playing the saxophone!

 It actually makes a lot of sense, and this time it sure does look like him. That's pretty much the exact same profile in that picture with Hager from around 1902. Everything about how he looks lines up with other pictures I've seen of him. seven his descendants chimed in to say it looks a lot like "pop" as his grandchildren called him. 

All-right folks. I know it's been awhile since I've posted on here, and for that I apologize. I have been quite busy with research projects, particularly in communicating with Ring and Hager's descendants. After several years, I have finally been able to get somewhere with truly understanding the curious relationship between these two. There are more layers peeling away as I keep learning more about them, which is certainly a good thing! While this is good, it does make writing posts difficult, as I have to spend the time pulling apart each artifact and conversation. I've also been busy with maintaining my quickly growing record collection. within the last three months I've gotten close to 100 records, and more are on the way. I am officially out of space for my discs! It's a good feeling but frustrating for someone like me who wants everything organized. 

Stay safe and well out there! We can get through this folks! Keep listening! Keep digging! Stay curious! 

Hope you enjoyed this! 

Ancestry digging and understanding Ringleben

It has been a difficult few months for me.  Since the beginning of April I dealt with serious panic attacks and crippling anxiety...but finally I have come out the other side. 

Since being locked down here in Northern California, it's given me lots of time to think about things, and you'd think that I would have written more here, but I simply haven't been in the right mood to do so. 

For that month I was out of commission, I could barely think about old records and rag-time, that's how bad it was. After that blew over, I was back to drawing, sewing, and thinking. 

About two weeks ago, I decided to dive back into some ancestry digging. Usually I do so to check things I have already seen, and this time is proved to be a good idea. In the past, Hager's family history has been somewhat vague, with the basic information known but the specifics aren't present. Thanks to a descendant of Hager's sister Georgiana, a lot of information was added within the last few months and this has opened up a lot of new questions, and answered some I had. Fred's history is still vague, but Jimmy's is far more complete! 

There are those boys! 

So I am not sure if I've said in the past on here, but I'm pretty sure these boys didn't like each other so much. In Fred's papers(or what's left of it) I see nothing on Jimmy anywhere, though they worked and lived closely for so many years. In 1905, both Fred's and Jimmy's families lived together! 
So from what I've recently learned on Jimmy, he had the absolute worst luck. He married in 1902, at age 20, lost two kids in infancy before his only surviving son was born in late 1905. His son, Mel, was the only male grandchild in the family, a great accomplishment considering brother Fred hadn't any male children. Mel was killed in a NY transit accident at the mere age of 36. In a previous post I highlighted that Mel was the type of young man who lived at home always working different jobs when the census people came around. His young wife Alice(born in 1908) died in 1940. Based on census records, Mel had likely just married Alice only a few months before, because in the 1940 census he was still listed as single. Some terrible luck indeed! 

Jimmy had to witness so many deaths of his children, which really broke my heart to learn. He already had it hard enough trying to scrape by as his brother's underling for so many years, and all his unfortunate luck with married life just adds insult to injury. 
On the brighter side, it seems that longevity runs in Hager's family, as his mother Annie, lived to the age of 99! She was born in 1850, and died in 1949, which is a hell of a lifespan. She would have seen the full extent of her sons' careers, and died not even a decade before her first born did.  Jimmy's daughter Veronica died in 2010 at age 100! In clippings from Hager's scrapbook, there was some mention of their father Mel. According to one page, Mel was a musical guy who encouraged all his children to enter in the music world. He worked on the railroad in the woods of Pennsylvania until 1881 when he decided to move the family to Manhattan.  Just a side note, Annie was pregnant with Jimmy when they moved! 

So with all this new information on the extended family, I am more intrigued by the tragedy that surrounded Jimmy Hager. He was naturally gifted musically, but was forced into the recording business by his overbearing and successful brother Fred. He always looked bitter, like there was something constantly troubling him, and it seems that there was. His drumming on all those Zon-O-Phone's has a lot more meaning now. 







So while doing all this Hager digging on Ancestry, I did realize something essential in understanding Ring and Hager's relationship. For a long while I've been trying to sort out when they split up the first time, and it seems that I have finally figured it out! Before spending time really thinking about the circumstances, I assumed they split in the middle of 1906, as by that time Ring was working for Seminary music and running the Zono orchestra with Eddie King. Turns out I was a year off!  
The way I found out was simply this sheet here: 

(a 1905 Ring sheet, from my collection)

So this sheet here, you might notice, was published by Ring. This publishing firm didn't last more than a year, as it was a vanity project originally hatched by Hager for his and Ring's music. Ultimately the firm didn't present itself to be very productive, so it folded not long after the publication of the sheet above. So what has this to do with his relationship with Hager? Well, actually a lot. 
This sheet's composer is neither Ring nor Hager, rather unusual for the publisher. This piece is likely one of half a dozen sheets they published within that year. It appears to be disassociated form Hager in every way possible, until you get to the back page:

Ah yes, Handsome Harry, that infernal specimen of male temptation. 
So there are only two pieces really advertised here, Handsome Harry and Jovial Joe, which considering the circumstances isn't really surprising. But the mere fact that Ring published such an obscure composer than wasn't associated with either of them, or recording for that matter proves some kind of separation from Hager. Honestly I had no idea Ring was still publishing independently in 1905, I assumed that when Hager officially joined Helf in late 1904 that he bought up all of Ring's stock(kinda not a great thing to do to your companion I'd think). He and Helf eventually did that, but evidently, not right away, which is curious. Another thing to note about this sheet is that the publishing address is slightly different from that of Jovial Joe. when I went to New York in January, I sat on the steps of 55 West 28th street, the address listed on Jovial Joe, but it turns out that he had moved to Helf and Hager's address by early 1905, which is very strange, even though it does make sense. 

So there's actually another layer to this story, thanks to Hager's family I know now that Fred's youngest daughter, Ethel, was born November 7th of 1905. If you were thinking what I was thinking, that would put conception around the time that the Ring sheet above was published. 



Think on that for a moment. 












So there's that. Before I close out, I'd like to talk a little about Ring. He his still as mysterious as he's always been. Little bits about him show up here and there, but the majority of what we'd like to know about him is still unknown. 

Hager's special portrait of Ring in his scrapbook(from my collection)

In a future post I'd like to talk about the importance of studying body language in what few pictures we have of these recording folks. From what there is to be observed about Ring, his non-verbal speaks volumes. He was a quiet and industrious worker, speaking few words and always buried in music. With so little to say, and often a blank face, his body language speaks as much as we could understand. In all the pictures there are of him, he was awkward in some kind of way, sometimes more than others. He was definitely a dandy(as Hager was), but he didn't want to attract much attention as others like Hylands or Hager would. His eyes were always cast aside, his legs a little undecided, but his hands were always graceful. It's little things like this that can help us better understand these weirdos who made all these early records.
 In my next post I hope to do some of this non-verbal analysis. Believe it or not, you can actually gather a lot from pictures of these folks, even though they were taken in an era where we normally wouldn't associate such quirks. A great example for unlocking the core of Hager's personality comes from those home movies that Jim Walsh took at the John Bieling Day memorial in 1950. Just from a few short clips of Hager(although silent) interacting with old farts like Billy Murray and Eugene Rose, all the traits I've described him with come through perfectly. 


Anyhow, that's all I got for now. I have had lots of ideas for blog posts since getting over my weird attacks, but formulating one good idea has been difficult, as I've spent a lot of time thinking things over. Another idea I've had is discussing the evolution of Rag-Time in fashion, as this is something that has caught my eye in the last few weeks. There were specific styles that young men and women wore in the middle and late 1890's that quickly became associated with rag-time, some of which are part of the era's stereotype as we know it today. Anyway, I'll close it off there. 

Hope you enjoyed this, and are staying healthy! 

Mysterious Ring and Newspaper digging

Well folks, here we are confined to our homes. Here in California we have been on lockdown for a bit longer than other places in the U.S. It's been a week and a half here since I've left the house, so what have I been doing with all this time? Well, a majority of this time has been dedicated to drawing and digging through newspapers.

 In the last few days I decided to dive back into going through newspapers. It's been over a year since I actually sat down and went through page after page. I forget how tedious it was, but ultimately rewarding. So before I dig into the newspaper stuff, I have been meaning to talk about a few interesting things I learned about Justin Ring. A few months back, I did a deep search on Ring in public records. In the past I have explained how difficult it's been to find him in any public records before 1915. The issue with finding him has been that his name was spelled at least 3 different ways. His full name was Justus Ringleben jr., but you almost never find his full name listed anywhere. 

So what to do? The best bet I had was spelling his name very slightly differently to finally find him in 1905. After a few years of trying to find him before 1915, I finally found him in the 1905 NY state census. 

He was living in the Bronx not too far from the Hager's and his younger brother Franz. When i saw where he was listed, he was living with a woman named Alice. Turns out he was married to her before he married Elsie in 1909. 

Later I found that Justus and Alice married in November of 1903. As far as I could find, this marriage produced no children. They were split by 1908. 

(Ring, probably taken in 1902)

So of course my curiosity peaked upon knowing of Ring's first marriage. So why is it that I hadn't known of this first marriage? It's simple, Ring lied. 

In the 1930 and 1940 census, Ring was living in his wife Elsie's lodging house. he had difficulty providing all the information to the census taker of all the folks living with them, and with that, he also lied about when he was first married. One of the questions on the 1930 census was the age of each person at their first marriage. Ring answered 33. So that would mean his first marriage was to Elsie in 1909, therefore completely disregarding the whole Alice thing. 

But this isn't where Ring's mysteries end. As I kept trying to find what happened to his siblings, Franz and Rosie(as they called her), I noticed something that the family indicated with their parents. According to the family, Justus and Franz had a different mother from Rosie. Now talk about some intrigue! I had previously suspected that Justin's father was a bit of your stereotypical 19th century musician father. This would mean that he kind of cared about his kids, sat and wrote music most of the time, had many female lovers, and pledged that his oldest son would carry on the music. So all of this seems to be coming together, based on what I've been able to find on Justin's childhood. So this leads me to wonder about this mysterious woman who was the biological mother of Justus and Franz. Rosie's mother was the one who raised the children, but there must have been some sourness between the boys and their step-mother. As a result of this, Justus and Franz were close, often living in close proximity, away from Rosie, who had married up to a rich Jewish man named Eugene. 

Keep in mind that Ring grew up right by the Bowery(I know! I went in his apartment building and walked along their street!). When he was growing up there it was the famous late 19th century slum that became so infamous for the tenements. The Ringleben's were just a step above being a tenement family, living in a three room apartment in a crowded building among all those poor immigrant souls whose pictures haunt many of us historians now. I can only imagine how rough Justus and Franz's childhood was growing up there, sneaking in the dives and clubs of fighting drunks and amateur music. This rough upbringing must have quieted Justus, making for his reserved personality later in life. Both the boys didn't attend high school, they were done with their schooling around age 13. From there the two of them were writing out music for their father and likely rambling around the Bowery together in the early and mid 1890's. Just as a side note, "The Bowery" was written in 1892, at that time Justin was 16 and Franz was 14, the perfect age for little urchins to be out getting into trouble there. 

So maybe all of this is why Ring wanted to forget his early days in the business. And I haven't even mentioned his relationship with Hager! In previous posts I have talked in detail about how obsessed Hager was with Ring, and this actually leads me into the next part of this post. Two posts ago about the Hager scrapbook, I made a point to highlight the queerness of the full two pages with Ring's portrait and short bio. This and the countless mentions of Ring throughout can seem quite suspicious. I still have yet to find more examples to definitively prove that their relationship was more than professional, but the findings from this newspaper dig were very promising. 

As I kept digging, I came across a handful of pages from the local papers of Ring and Hager's neighborhood. In the mid 1910's, Ring and Hager moved their families out to Flushing, NY(which I also had the chance to visit while in NY two months ago), which is a suburb right on the water between the east river and Long Island Sound, right by Queens. They lived here for the next three decades, and thankfully, the local papers really took to them both, well, Hager more particularly. By the middle of the depression, Hager was starting to slow down his career, no longer working in record labs, but he was working on radio with Ring. Ring was still working for Decca by 1936, but he still had the heart to prowl around with Hager in their neighborhood. The clippings I found ranged in date from 1932 to 1936, and most of them were on Hager rather than Ring, but yes indeed they were mentioned together very often. The way the column talks about them, it seems almost like there is some kind of inside joke about them being together.

So anyway, in February of 1936, this happened:

That sucks. 
Hager tripped and broke his ankle, and he was 61 when this happened! 
This little portion of Hager's writing was awfully nice to read, and it very much matches up with the other examples of his writing I have. The image of him stuck in bed hating the weather is quite relatable being stuck at home now. 
But see, there's one thing that I missed the first few times I read through this, look at how he addresses his old buddy:

"Justy Ring"

That's awfully interesting. It took several reads of this piece to catch that. It is very curious that he included that in the letter, so playfully referring to his old partner. Now I am convinced more that their relationship was more than just professional. 
So, the next few pieces in that same column presented updates on Hager's nearly month long recovery. They still continued to mention Ring and Hager together, calling them partners every time they were mentioned. So as it turns out, Hager was a local celebrity in his neighborhood, and he often wrote to the local paper. Thankfully the writer of the column was a regular friend of Hager's so they often wrote about his working in radio and writing music. I'm hoping that a little while back i at least mentioned the boat fiasco of 1922, if not, here's the piece to refresh:

So that happened...
After nearly killing his friends and employers, Hager not surprisingly bought another boat not too long afterward. According to one of the local papers on him from 1932, this boat he got after the "swanee Smiles" incident, was called Kathryn. I have no idea where he would have gotten that name from, but my curiosity with it has become quite itchy. Of course he got another boat after the first one, great going there Hager. So this got me thinking about the amount of money Hager must have had. In the post about the scrapbook I mentioned an over 27,000 dollar amount that Hager tried to get through a lawsuit over royalties in 1906. Now thats over 2 million in today's money, and somehow I doubt Hager's ambitions to get that amount for just a single song. 
He was suing to get that amount of money out of Laughing Water, which as we know was a major hit for many years, but I'm not so sure about it getting that much money in royalties in just two years. 
Whether or not he got that money, it did give me some real numbers, as I had wondered for many years how much money Hager actually had. If the money was anything like that, it makes him buying that defective motor boat seem like pocket change. 

Anyhow, Hager was rich. 


So, while doing this dig I also found a very sad piece on Hager's publishing with Helf. So it turns out that in 1910 their office on Broadway(which they had moved to the previous year) burned down. According to the piece, it was completely destroyed, with no sheets saved. 
So this actually answers the two important questions I had about them. I wondered what exactly caused Hager to leave, and also about why some sheets of theirs are very common and why others aren't. So this fire answers both of those questions. It also explains why sheets from them dated 1909-1910 are almost non-existent. Hager was too broken by this fire to jump back in with Helf, so he left, rather desperate, for Boston. Helf mourned for a little while but was back into the business within a few months, proving to become a successful publisher without Hager. This explains very well why Hager went to such a risky but desperate job right after working with Helf. Anything seemed good to him, and he wanted nothing to do with Helf or the other recording folks, no matter how long it lasted(the Phono-cut stuff ended in 1913). 


While on this ambitious newspaper dig, I decided to jump back into the Hylands stuff. It's been awhile, as I thought i had already seen most of what there is to see on Hylands in terms of newspapers. Well, thanks or one of the websites I use other than newspapers.com, they added some new stuff in the middle of last year. Most of this new stuff was quite different from what I had seen before. Most of these new sections came from a publication called The New York Player, which was a paper similar to the NY Clipper for the White rats. The first one I found was from 1913, about Hylands being the master of ceremonies at a large event for the White Rats. Not only was he the master of ceremonies at this event, but he was also the leader of the orchestra(not surprisingly). This piece was quite long, so he was mentioned a handful of times, which is nice. There were more than one of these events it seemed, as I had heard that they hosted lavish balls such as this one where Hylands was the master. Another mentioned Hylands as playing piano duets with famous rag-time composer George Botsford. Botsford wrote "Black and White rag" and many others that ended up becoming "standards". 
As i kept reading these various pieces on him working with the White Rats, it made a lot more sense to me how important he was in the organization. It wasn't very clear anywhere else, but after reading through a few of these, it becomes clear that he was one of the major leaders that everyone knew. 
The prize of the Hylands part of this dig was a picture! 
The new picture of Hylands in front of the Columbia lab was quite a score, and this one from the NY Player proved almost just as such. 

a rather blurry, grinning Hylands around 1898. 
So here's the new picture:

Oh my god! 
Okay, so upon first seeing this picture, Marie Hylands is easy to pick out, she's right in the front to the left of the lifesaver. The issue with this picture that I had was figuring out exactly where Hylands is. I can't really tell if he's the fourth or the second from the right in the back row. The description for the picture is nice to see, though him not being well is a bit depressing. From what the period sources indicated, Hylands was not well by the time they decided to go on this English tour in 1913, but he went with them anyway, refusing to let his pain and weakness hinder him. Of course, he died while on this tour. 

I did plenty more searches on this dig, but I will save those for another post. Before closing out I'd like to mention another picture that I cam across while going back through the Jim Walsh articles. After getting to really spend some time thinking about Hager's scrapbook, I went back through his writings to Walsh, curious to see if there was anything to fill in place where things seemed to be lacking in Hager's stories(more than we already know). While going back through the Walsh stuff, I went back to that one statement that Walsh said about Ring and Hager...you know, the inseparable companion thing. 
Right next to the picture of Ring and Hager together(the cropped version is above in this post), there's a portrait of a mysterious musician. 
This is the picture:

So, who is that?
Walsh claimed it was Fred Rose, a performer in Len Spencer's minstrels of 1899-1900. That immediately seemed suspicious. The first thing that struck me was that it couldn't be Hylands, but after thinking about the circumstances and staring at the minor details of the picture, I was starting to think that it might actually be a mislabeled portrait of a young Fred Hylands. From the Columbia exhibition picture, Hylands doesn't look too frightening, and somehow the unruly flash seemed to flatter his young face, unlike the candid Carson picture in front of the Columbia lab. 

The dimple chin and slightly curled lips along with the side parted(red looking) hair got me wondering about it. Also, Etta Hylands, his sister, had a nose that looked a lot like that. The tired, dilated eyes are also interesting. The placement of the picture itself in Walsh's writing is also curious, putting it right next to the other prominent accompanist of that period, Justin Ring. So there is a chance that this is an early portrait of Hylands, but I'm not making any definitive claims yet. 
I promise to talk about more of the newspaper findings soon. It was a lot to fit into one post so splitting it up seemed appropriate. 

Anyhow, hope the isolation/quarantine is going well for everyone, stay well out there if you can! We'll get through this. We have records and research to do! 

Hope you enjoyed this!