RUTH WILLIS - VOCALIST & MAID

Ruth Willis died 45 years ago today, aged 64, in Atlanta. Aka Ruth Day and Mary Willis, she made several records - including with Willie McTell - but had to keep a day-job as a maid.

Her first session was for Columbia in Atlanta in October 1931, when she was accompanied by McTell (who speaks and sings as well as playing 12-string guitar) on four tracks: 'Rough Alley Blues', 'Talkin' To You Wimmen About The Blues', 'Experience Blues' and 'Painful Blues'. The first two were issued as a single on the OKeh label, billed as by Mary Willis, accompanied by Blind Willie McTell; the other two tracks were issued as a Columbia single as by Ruth Day accompanied by Blind Sammie.

A week later, on Hallowe'en, she made another OKeh single, 'Low Down Blues' c/w 'Merciful Blues', accompanied this time not only by Willie but by his splendid friend Curley Weaver, and issued as by Mary Willis.

She had one more day in the studio - in New York City, in January 1933, this time without McTell.

She and Willie got on well. Then he married Ruthy Kate Williams, in January 1934. The two women's names were similar enough that people have sometimes conjectured that they were the same person. They certainly were not. In fact after Ms Williams married Willie, she stopped Ms Willis coming round to the house.

Ruth Willis died the same year as Curley Weaver (1962), and three years after Willie. His wife survived a further three decades.

The photo (and I'm sorry to say that I've lost track of where it came from or who it belongs to) shows housework training in Macon, Georgia in 1935...