| Summary: | Arnold Dwight “Gatemouth” Moore - (b. Nov 8, 1913, d. May 19, 2004). Starting his career on the air at WIBW in Topeka, Kansas, his home town, in the 1930's, Moore was a major blues singer in the 1930’s and 40's and a prolific recording artist and gospel singer, minister and radio announcer in the 40's and 50’s... moving from AM 730 WDIA* Memphis in 1949 to AM 1220 WEDR and AM 1400 WJLD in Birmingham, from 1950 through 1957. His accomplishments can best be appreciated by listening to both interviews in the BBRM archive. This interview was done by phone while Gatemouth was at home in Yazoo, Mississippi.
This early interview was the second done with Gatemouth Moore. One of Bob Friedman's earliest interviews, he was mainly working to have Moore share as much as he could of the lay of the land, regarding WEDR and WJLD announcers in the early 50's. Friedman's zeal is best expressed by his sharing with Gatemouth how the collection was growing and by his hope Moore would follow through sending Friedman his music. The BBRM was a year old and much information was still needed. Gatemouth refers to individuals that Friedman has not yet learned about. When Gatemouth does not eventually recall those names, we have placed a note to name the individual.
* WDIA's power was rated at 250 watts from 1947 until 1954 when they changed frequencies to 1070 AM and were allowed to increase power to 50,000 watts.
|
|---|
