Bert (Snake Root) Hatton

 Blues singer, and composer who recorded two titles for Vocalion, either in Chicago or St. Louis, in 1927. Hatton was the son of a Methodist Minister from Topeka, Kansas and won first place as Kansas Tenor in the Federation Contest in the early 1920's. By 1927, Hatton was 23 years old and was located in Columbia, Missouri, rehearsing with five other musicians for an engagement with Southern Keith circuit and was being billed as Bert Hatton and his Kullid Kids. In June of 1927, while performing at Jimmie's College Inn, a representative from the Vocalion record company heard Bert play and offered him a trying in Chicago where he made his first record. While recording there was an audience of about one hundred artists waiting to record and among them was Gene Austin, who was there to record "Yesterday." He got the name "Snake Root" from a series of his songs which were known as Southern snake root melodies. By the early 1930's Bert had dropped the "Snake Root" and began his career as a singing evangelist in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Reverend Hatton would travel the nation and appear on WLXW radio in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Rev. Hatton would continue to travel and evangelize through the 1960's