calsfoundation@cals.org
March 14, 1972
John Quincy Wolf Jr., a college professor and self-trained folklorist who left a lasting legacy through his scholarship and the collecting and recording of mid-South folk music and folk tales, died. Wolf is credited with discovering and encouraging folk music performers such as Almeda Riddle, Ollie Gilbert, and Jimmy Driftwood. He was recognized by his contemporaries as an authority, and he advised promoters of the Newport [Rhode Island] Folk Festival concerning performers. His recollections of his father’s tales of growing up in the Ozarks after the Civil War were put together following his death and published by his widow, Bess, and a Memphis State University professor, F. Jack Hurley, as Life in the Leatherwoods.