By Jim Hopkins
Boulevard Publisher

The economy was bursting at the seams after World War II, and with wartime conservation over, businesses were churning out consumer goods like never before.

That included electric kitchen mixers, RCA Victor television sets — and every young Louisvillian’s must-have: an analogue sound storage medium in the form of a flat polyvinyl chloride disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove.

Yes, we’re talking about records! And the Variety Record Shop at 645 South Fourth St. downtown had them on sale one momentous day in April 1951. These were 78 rpm’s, according to an advertisement the store placed in The Courier-Journal that morning. Intriguingly, Variety was selling sets of 20 “hillbilly records” for $2.98 — no other information supplied.

That sounds cheap, until you adjust it for inflation: $2.98 in 2016 dollars would be $27.42, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator.

One of the most popular recordings on Billboard’s 1951 chart was Maysville-native Rosemary Clooney‘s “Come On-a My House.” (Listen to it on YouTube.)

What made that April 3 Tuesday so important can only be appreciated in hindsight: Continue reading “65 years ago: hillbilly music for sale on a historic day” →