Tuesday, November 14, 1933

Walked with Pauline, Bernice, Virginia, Ruth and Nadine to school. I stayed all night over at Mrs. Raifert's.

Pete Johnson (March 25, 1904 – March 23, 1967)
American boogie-woogie and jazz pianist

Born in Kansas City, Missouri, Johnson has been called "one of the three great boogie-woogie
 pianists (along with Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons) whose sudden prominence in the
the 1930s helped make the style very popular."

Johnson began his musical career in 1922 as a drummer in Kansas City. From 1926 into the 1930s
he worked as a pianist, often accompanying Big Joe Turner. A record producer discovered
him in 1936 and got him to play at the Famous Door in New York. His concert with Turner at
Carnegie Hall started the "boogie-woogie craze." The song "Roll 'Em Pete", composed by Turner
and Johnson, was one of the first rock-and-roll records, although there is strong reason to believe
they stole that piece from Jelly Roll Morton who neglected to register his works, leaving him
without claim to them. Johnson continued to tour and to play until a stroke in 1958 left him
partially paralyzed. He died in a hospital in Buffalo, New York, at the age of 62.