Scott Joplin

By Silmi Merchant

  • Scott Joplin Was born

  • The Family Moves to Texarkana

  • Young Joplin began free piano lessons from Julius Weiss

  • Weiss lodged as family tutor for lumberman Col. R. W. Rodgers

  • Col.R.W. Rodgers died ad Weiss left town

  • Scott became an assistant teacher in Texarkana's Negro school

  • Joplin settled in St. Louis

  • Joplin played in sporting areas adjacent to the Columbian Exposition in Chicago

  • he moved to Sedalia

  • Joplin enrolled in Sedalia's George R. Smith College for Negroes, studying piano and theory.

  • Scott became known as an entertainer at the Maple Leaf Club

  • he traveled to Kansas City, where Carl Hoffman issued Joplin's first ragtime publications, including his best-known piece, Maple Leaf Rag

  • Period: to

    Many of his new rags were being sold, and his music was becoming a hit

  • He moved back to St. Louis

  • He moved to New York to devote his serious energies to the production of Treemonisha(one of his productions)

  • Joplin had contracted syphilis and his health had deteriorated considerably

  • Scott Joplin died