Ancestral Trails Historical Monthly Meeting

Professor / Special Formats Librarian

Special Collections

Western Kentucky University

Program:  Mose Rager: Kentucky’s Incomparable Guitar

This presentation tells the story of a true Kentucky music legend who preferred living the quiet life to the fame he could have earned playing the country music circuit.

There are many country guitar legends, such as Chet Atkins, Merle Travis, and Eddie Pennington, who trace the roots of their music to this shy guitar master of Muhlenberg County, Kentucky (home of the Everly Brothers). Known for developing this unique thumb -picking style, Mose worked as a barber and a coal miner when he wasn’t playing gigs with Grandpa Jones, Curly Fox, and Texas Ruby.

Mose died on May 14, 1986; his sound lives on when modern-day pickers try to play, That Muhlenberg Sound.”