Ray R. Myers Souvenir Folder

Ray R. Myers Souvenir Folder

Souvenir Folder of Ray R. Myers, "The Armless Musician." The fold-out souvenir photo album includes nine photos of Myers playing guitar, drinking wine, combing his hair, and performing other tasks with his feet.

Born without arms in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, in 1911, the dapper and versatile Myers learned to play steel guitar with his feet, performing at the 1933 World's Fair and in subsequent radio broadcasts for Robert L. Ripley of Ripley's Believe it ... Or Not. By the late 1930s Myers had become a regular performer on Wheeling, West Virginia's WWVA and, for the next three decades, appeared on additional stations in West Virginia, Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Alabama, and Tennessee.

By the mid-1950s Myers had joined the cast of Birmingham, Alabama, radio station WVOK's Dixie Jamboree (see the full cast photo, also in this collection), and with the Brewster Brothers and their Smoky Muntaineers he appeared on the air and at personal appearances across the state. He later appeared on Nashville's WLAC, before returning to his native Pennsylvania, where he died in 1986.