Remembering Billy Curlew

One of my favorite family photographs shows Billy Curlew, then close to 63, holding the team. My uncle Clair is sitting on the rail, my aunt Eleanor standing right foreground, and my grandfather Sam Seaton standing behind. It was taken about 1925 (based on the apparent ages of Clair, born in September 1915, and Eleanor, about two years older).

Billy Curlew was born in 1862 while his band was on a...