Rudy Thacker

Like many musicians from the southern mountains, he moved to Cleveland for work and for the chance to play, after having been a member of the WWVA World’s Original Jamboree. In Cleveland he led the Stringbusters, whose members included Sam Duckett, and he was counted among the best country and rockabilly guitarists in the city. He made singles for the Lucky, Blue Hen and Whirl labels, among them “Black Train,” “Mountain Guitar” and “Stringbuster,” and in 1960 and 1961 he and the band hosted a weekly Saturday-night show at the Dennison Theatre that also presented touring acts. From 1962 he worked more folk music into his act; his last known record dates from 1964.

In April 1966, at a session in Akron produced by Lee Sutton, he played guitar with Wiseman and the Dobro player Peggy Peterson on the songs issued in 1967 as Mac Wiseman Sings Old Time Country Favorites, among them “Wreck of the Old 97,” “Grandfather’s Clock,” “When They Ring Those Golden Bells,” “There’s More Pretty Girls Than One” and “Sourwood Mountain.” His last documented appearance in Cleveland was at the Heidelberg later that year, playing with Larry Huff, Eddie Gilmore and Fred Blake, and not long afterward he gave up music and moved to Texas.