Euday Louis Bowman
Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(Nov. 9, 1886 - May 26, 1949) Fort Worth native Euday Bowman was a ragtime composer. His best known song was the classic "12th Street Rag," which he wrote about his experiences in Kansas City, Kansas. Copyrighted in 1914, it did not become popular until 1948 when it was recorded by Walter "Pee Wee" Hunt. Other songs written by Bowman, including "Fort Worth Blues," were never published. He died of pneumonia while on a business trip to New York City in 1949. Recorded - 1980
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Fort Worth native Euday Bowman (1886–1949) was a ragtime composer whose best-known piece, the 12th Street Rag, drew on his time in Kansas City. Copyrighted in 1914, the tune languished until Pee Wee Hunt's 1948 recording turned it into a national hit—success Bowman barely lived to see, dying of pneumonia in New York the next year. Other works, like his unpublished Fort Worth Blues, never found the same audience.
Why it matters
Bowman's story captures the hard economics of early American popular music, where a composer could write a durable standard decades before it finally paid off.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Euday Bowman was born in Fort Worth in 1886. He grew up in a rough, fast-growing cattle and railroad town during the years when ragtime was taking over American popular music. Ragtime, with its syncopated, "ragged" rhythms, came largely out of African American musical traditions. By around 1900 it was everywhere: in saloons and dance halls, and on parlor pianos through sheet music.
In that era, most money in popular music came from selling sheet music, not records. A composer usually sold a song to a publisher, sometimes outright for a small sum, and success depended on whether amateurs bought copies to play at home. It was a hard way to make a living, and many talented writers never earned much from their work.
By World War I, ragtime's popularity was giving way to jazz and new dance styles. A rag copyrighted in 1914 arrived near the end of the craze. That timing explains a lot about why Bowman's best-known piece had to wait so long to be heard widely.
People & events
Bowman was a ragtime composer whose most famous work was "12th Street Rag." According to the marker, he based it on his experiences in Kansas City. He copyrighted the piece in 1914, but for decades it never became the hit it would later be.
That changed in 1948, when trombonist and bandleader Walter "Pee Wee" Hunt recorded it. His lively version became a huge popular success, and the tune Bowman had written more than thirty years earlier was suddenly everywhere. It is one of the great late-blooming hits in American music.
Bowman had little time to enjoy it. He died of pneumonia in May 1949 while on a business trip to New York City, about a year after Hunt's recording. Other songs he wrote, including one he called "Fort Worth Blues," were never published. That is a reminder of how much of an artist's work can disappear when it never reaches print.
Its place in the American story
Bowman's career shows how the early American music business worked. A song could be written, copyrighted and largely forgotten, then revived decades later by a new recording. Records, radio and new audiences were taking over from sheet music as the way songs spread, and "12th Street Rag" bridged those two eras.
His story also shows that ragtime reached well beyond its famous centers. Composers working in Texas and across the Midwest helped make it a truly national music. Bowman's hometown, Fort Worth, belongs in that story.
The tune itself outlasted the man. "12th Street Rag" became a standard, played by countless musicians and recognized by people who never knew who wrote it. Remembering Bowman gives credit to one of the many working composers whose music became part of the American soundtrack.
If you visit
This marker honors a person, not a building, so the best way to experience it is to bring the music with you. Before or after your stop, listen to "12th Street Rag," ideally Pee Wee Hunt's 1948 version and an earlier piano rendition. Hearing how the same melody changed between eras makes Bowman's story easy to grasp.
As you stand in Fort Worth, picture the city he grew up in: a booming frontier town where railroads, cattle and nightlife met, and where piano players worked in public halls and private parlors. That lively, crowded world helped produce musicians like Bowman.
The marker fits easily into a day exploring Fort Worth's history, from its cattle-trail heritage to its old downtown. It is a small stop, but it adds music to a city better known for cowboys, and it is a good reminder that Texas helped shape American popular song.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Euday Louis Bowman
- · Walter "Pee Wee" Hunt
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Khleber Miller Van Zandt
Fort Worth, TX
A Tennessee-born major in the 7th Texas Infantry, Khleber Miller Van Zandt came to Fort Worth in 1865 and threw himself into building the frontier town. As merchant, banker, and rancher he helped make the city a rail hub and had a hand in founding its newspaper, public schools, streetcars, and First Christian Church. He served in the state legislature and the 1875 Constitutional Convention, and late in life led the United Confederate Veterans nationally.
Garvey-Veihl House
Fort Worth, TX
This lot began as part of the Foster family's holdings and, in 1884, gained a modest one-story cottage built by William and Lula Garvey after their move from Kentucky. By the late 1890s they had expanded it into the exuberant two-story Queen Anne seen today, complete with turrets, dormers, and wrap-around porches — fitting for Samuels Avenue, then the address of Fort Worth's wealthiest families. After passing through the Veihl family, the house survived abandonment and a brush with condemnation in the 1970s.
Paddock Viaduct
Fort Worth, TX
For decades, only low-water crossings and ferries linked downtown Fort Worth with the city's north side across the Trinity River, and an 1890s suspension bridge soon proved inadequate. Completed in 1914 to a design by the St. Louis firm Brenneke and Fay, the Paddock Viaduct was the first reinforced-concrete arch bridge in the nation to use self-supporting reinforcing steel—a genuine engineering milestone. It honors B.B. Paddock, the former legislator and Fort Worth mayor who championed the city's growth.
Eastern Cattle Trail
Fort Worth, TX
A block of native Trinity River stone here marks the dusty path that made Fort Worth. From the end of the Civil War until the railroad arrived in 1876, great herds of longhorns were driven up Rusk Street and across the river, resting in the valley below before the long push north to Abilene, Kansas. This route — the Eastern or McCoy Trail, which joined the Chisholm Trail at the Red River — earned Fort Worth its lasting nickname, 'Cow Town.'