Don Messer Donald Charles Frederick Messer was born in Tweedside , NB , on May 9, 1909 , the youngest of 11 children.
He began playing the fiddle when he was five and started playing for dances when he was seven.
At the age of 16, Don moved to Boston where he worked at various jobs and studied music for a time. When he returned to New Brunswick he played at dances and parties in private homes.
He played his first radio show on May 19, 1929 over the then Canadian Radio Commission. This later became the CBC station CFBO, later changed to CHSJ. The group was called The New Brunswick Lumberjacks and their fame quickly spread. In 1938, renamed the “Backwoods Breakdown”, they started broadcasting coast-to-coast from Saint John.
The following year they moved to Charlottetown, PE, where they broadcast their “down east” music three nights a week over CFCY, transmitted all across Canada . Here the name was changed to “Don Messer and his Islanders”.
In 1958 the Don Messer Jubilee Show from Halifax began on CBC-TV nationwide. It soon became Canada 's most popular TV show. The show's cancellation by the CBC Network in 1969 aroused such a furor that many people protested at the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa . The show was continued in syndication from Ontario until Don Messer's death in 1972.
His music lives on in his many compositions and recordings which will continue to be enjoyed for many years to come.
Ned Landry was born in Saint John February 2, 1921 the third eldest in a family of seven.
He got his start on George Martin's Kiddies Review as a dancer when he was twelve years old. He started playing the fiddle when he was fourteen.
In 1939 he joined Don Messer at the Eastern Sportsmen Show in New York and Boston . He played with Don Messer for many years and was the original leader of The Maritime Farmers.
Ned was already famous before he signed his first recording contract in 1952. Along with his singles, he has recorded 30 LP's. His records are preserved in the official archives of the Nashville Hall of Fame and the National Library of Canada. He has written over 300 tunes.
He won the North American Fiddle Championship three times – in 1956, 1957 and 1962. He also won the Burns Chuckwagon Show Contest in 1951.He has appeared on Don Messer's Jubilee, Country Hoedown, Up Home Tonight and Radio Canada.
He has been married for 13 years to the former Celina LeBlanc and they have 6 children and 19 grand-children.
Ned still lives in Saint John and is kept busy providing his wonderful music through personal appearances and recordings.
Kidd Baker Ransford Lawrence “Kidd” Baker was born in North Tilley in 1917. When he was about ten years old, he learned a tune on his father's fiddle. By the time he was 15 years old, he was playing the banjo, mandolin, guitar and fiddle.
In 1934 he entered an Amateur Show at the Capital Theatre in Millinocket , Maine . After he had won first prize, the emcee called him “the Yodelling Kid”. The name stuck, and “Kidd” Baker became well known across Canada and United States .
In 1938 he had his first radio show over Station CFNB in Fredericton each Saturday night.
In 1940 he started a show called The Maritime Ranch Boys. They played shows and dances several nights a week while Kidd continued working in a bakery during the day. After the war, he left the bakery and went into show business full time. The show was changed to “The Kidd Baker Show”, and with three trailers, a seven passenger car and a sound truck, they toured all over New Brunswick the first year.
The show made its headquarters in Kitchener , Ontario until 1953, then moved to Victoria , BC for a time. In 1954 he moved back to the Maritimes with a show on CHSJ, and later back to CFNB and The Saturday Night Jamboree. Kidd made records for Gavotte and Quality labels and published a number of song books.
In 1953 Kidd bought a restaurant in Woodstock , NB which he operated for 15 years before retiring.
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