William Blevins' Quartette - Wasn't That A Mighty Day ~1937

William Blevins was born on February 28, 1895 in Selma, Alabama to a decently well-off family, the grandson to Reverend Howard Johnson who lived on approximately 200 acres of land, and the only African-Americans in that part of town. He and his younger brother were primarily raised by their mother, Mary, after their father drown in the Alabama River when young William was only four. Even by that time, he was memorizing songs and singing them. Growing up, he would sing at local churches and was well known by most of the community. He would attend Selma University, and even had his own car. In 1916, he would move to Birmingham, Alabama where he ended up being drafted into the Army and sent to fight in World War I. Immediately upon return, he reconnected with the Tabernacle Baptist Church and did any job he could to help out. Of course he would find his way into the choir and was the star soloist for 25 years. He worked a few different jobs over the years hopping from the T.C.I. plant to becoming an insurance agent, then to Pullman service where he would make one final transition to become a truck-driver for The Birmingham News newspaper from July 6, 1928 until his death in 1951.
On December 4, 1932, WKBC made an appeal for singers in which he immediately responded and got an audition on December 11. He was excited for the chance of becoming well known via radio, but also for the pride of being one of the first African-American radio artists as he couldn't recall any others at the time. Well, we obviously know how that audition went as he became very well known in and around his local area of Birmingham, Alabama for his radio presence as a spiritual singer on WSGN in which he was billed as "The South's first race announcer". There, he led the "Blevins Aggregation" in a spiritual radio program for 18 years.
I'm thinking today's band, the "William Blevins' Quartette" is a rename of his Aggregation for the American Record Corporation. The group had one recording session in Birmingham, Alabama in March of 1937 in which 2 records (4 sides) were produced for the Melotone and Coqueror labels, including today's song, "Wasn't That A Mighty Day". The lineup for his Aggregation around 1946 is as follows: William Blevins (bass), Roosevelt Thomas and Ruby Edwards (Soprano), Duglas Scott (tenor), and Annie Blevins (alto).
Blevins passed away in 1951. He was so well loved and respected that even in such heated times in the south, the funerary church made sure to allow everyone, regardless of race, the ability to attend so that even Blevins' white friends could see him off.