Tom Turpin: Select Works • Ragtime Music (1897-1917)

Born on November 18th, 1871 in Savannah, Georgia, Tom Turpin would spend his early life navigating through the busy period of reconstruction after the American Civil War. Yet do not get it twisted, for the rebuilding of the nation was not going to put a stop on Turpin's future legacy as one of the most prominent figures to ever contribute to the Ragtime Era.

John L. "Honest John" Turpin, Tom's father, was a freed slave who had become a political insider during this time, allowing for the Turpin's to uphold a steady financial life and relocate to St. Louis where their legacy of saloon-keeping had begun. In 1885, with the help of young Tom & his older brother Charles Turpin, John opened the Silver Dollar Saloon at 425 South 12th Street, which stayed in business for nearly 20 years, only to be razed for municipal expansion to accommodate the 1904 Lewis and Clark Exposition.

While Tom was found to be a gifted pianist in his teens, he only saw it as a means to an end, preferring the ability to make money playing while pursuing other ventures. One of these has long considered to have been a failed investment with Charles in the Big Onion mine in Searchlight, Nevada (which Scott Joplin would later name a piano rag for) in the mid to late 1880s. It was reported that Charles stayed in the area for a while, even spending some time in Mexico where he eventually pawned most of his belongings to survive with Tom not leaving much information about his time on the prairies of the West.

By 1892 both brothers were back in St. Louis living at 9 Targee Street, yet it may have been a little sooner for Tom as there is an indication he was briefly married at this time with one child, Thomas Jackson Turpin, who died in May 1892 at barely a year old. Whether he was the offspring of Tom or Charles is uncertain, but given the name it was likely Tom. The child's mother, Julie Anna Turpin died in July, 1893 at age 20 with no record of marriage or birth found to solidify who she was married to, but the address for both deaths was the same one that the Turpin brothers were listed at. By the 1894 directories, Tom was shown as a restaurant worker & bartender along with Charles, continuing to work with his father at the Silver Dollar, and also at The Castle run by Babe Connors. With his time spend around the saloons, Turpin continued to play and write with the new syncopated sensation that had slowly crept it's way throughout America, eventually becoming not only the first black composer with a published rag, the but the first published St. Louis ragtime composer as well. He was already writing and playing ragtime, according to legitimate sources, as early as 1892 with his "Harlem Rag" (1897) appearing in several editions, with sales from the piece providing him the capital to follow his own dream.

In 1898 Tom was involved in an incident at his father's saloon. According to an article in the St. Louis Post Dispatch in late February, he was arguing with a bar patron by the name of Keeler on "the relative merits of negro women." Inflamed by liquor, each drew a pistol and dared the other to shoot... It was a battle to the death and both of the black men exhibited nerve and bulldog tenacity... Then came a bullet that prostrated Keeler, entering his left side and he sank to the floor. Tom and John were initially arrested but the charges may have been dropped with no record showing either of the men being sentenced, even though the victim later died in the hospital.
Biography is continued in the pinned comment below.
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Timestamps:
00:00 - Harlem Rag (1897)
03:59 - Bowery Buck (1899)
06:27 - A Ragtime Nightmare (1900)
08:41 - St. Louis Rag (1903)
12:37 - Buffalo Rag (1904)
15:48 - Pan-Am Rag (c. 1914)
18:45 - When Sambo Goes to France (1917)
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Music composed by Thomas M. J. Turpin & performed by Mark Pedigo, Vincent M. Johnson, & Charlie Thompson.

Music description provided & written by Bill Edwards
© 1998-2024 Bill Edwards

This video is solely for the purposes of compiling and sharing the music of Thomas M. J. Turpin and in no way or means is being used for monetary purposes.