Snuffy Jenkins
| Snuffy Jenkins | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | DeWitt Jenkins |
| Also known as | "Snuffy" Jenkins |
| Born |
October 27, 1908 Harris, North Carolina, US |
| Died | April 29, 1990 (aged 81) |
| Genres | Bluegrass music, old time |
| Occupation(s) | Musician |
| Instruments | fiddle, banjo, guitar |
| Years active | 1927–1989 |
| Labels | Rounder Records |
| Associated acts | Smith Hammett Rex Brooks J. E. Mainer's Mountaineers Byron Parker's Hillbillies Jim Eanes Homer Sherrill |
DeWitt "Snuffy" Jenkins (October 27, 1908 – April 29, 1990) was an American old time banjo player and an early proponent of the three-finger banjo style.
Jenkins was born in Harris, North Carolina, as the last of ten children. He began playing the fiddle as a plucked instrument, switched to guitar and later to a home-made banjo he and his brother Verl had built. He bought his first real banjo in 1927, and soon fell under the influence of Smith Hammett and Rex Brooks, two early banjo players who did much for the development of Jenkins' style. In 1934, he appeared on the radio show Crazy Water Barn Dance over WBT in Charlotte, North Carolina with his newly formed group, the Jenkins String Band. The string band comprised Snuffy Jenkins on banjo, his brother Verl Jenkins on fiddle and a cousin on guitar. During this time, Jenkins also played in the W.O.W. String Band.
In 1936, he joined J. E. Mainer's Mountaineers as banjo player performing at local radio station WSPA in Spartanburg. The next year, in 1937, the Mountaineers were hired to perform over WIS in Columbia. The announcer of radio station WIS was Byron "The Old Hired Hand" Parker and he almost immediately took over the Mountaineers renaming them Byron Parker's Hillbillies. The Hillbillies, consisting of J. E. Mainer on fiddle, Jenkins on banjo, George Morris and Leonard Stokes on guitars, later recorded - without Byron Parker - under the name of J. E. Mainer's Mountaineers. J. E. Mainer soon left, and was replaced by Verl Jenkins on fiddle and Clyde Robbins on guitar.
In 1939, Parker hired Homer Sherrill on fiddle; Mainer, Stokes and Morris had left earlier. Parker changed the group's name to The WIS Hillbillies and in 1947, Julian "Greasy" Medlin, a guitar player and a veteran of the medicine show circuit, along with the bass player Ira Dimmery were added to the Hillbillies. The WIS Hillbillies mainly did minstrel shows with comedy skits as Jenkins dressed up in baggy pants while "Greasy" wore blackface. It was around this time Byron Parker gave Jenkins his nickname "Snuffy" because he used to wipe his nose with his sleeve during one of the skits. Byron Parker died in 1948, and Jenkins and Sherrill, who had taken over the band, changed its name to The Hired Hands in Parker's memory.
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