Lawrence 'Papa Egg Shell' Casey
Papa Egg Shell Casey was a St Louis bluesman in the 1930's. Sometimes also known as Papa Slick Head, Casey gained his nickname as a result of his premature baldness.
The few recordings he made demonstrate his dexterity on guitar using picked strings, backed by a strong, slightly nasal voice. His song "Goin' Up the Country", which he wrote, survives as a very accessible track and one of the best examples of takes on the 'Kansas City Blues' theme.

"Hambone" Willie Newbern
Newbern was an American country blues musician who was active from the 1920s to the 1940s.
A guitarist, singer, and mandolin player, Newburn was reported to have played with Yank Rachell and Sleepy John Estes.
Newburn recorded one of the earliest known versions of the blues standard "Rollin' and Tumblin'", which was waxed in Atlanta, Georgia in 1929.

Hambone = a certain type of dance that involves making noise with the body, especially by slapping parts of the body with one's hands.

Matthew "Hogman" Maxey
Maxey was an American blues singer and guitarist. Hogman was recorded as a prisoner in Angola State Penitentiary by Harry Oster, an American folklorist and musicologist.
It's quite a story how Maxey got his nickname: "When I was a kid I always believe' that I was a hog doctor, so every time daddy'd get a bunch of pigs and he'd leave home, I'd give a hog doctorin'. Every time my folks'd leave I'd find two or three of the hogs had appendicitis. And so I messed around and operated on too many of 'em. When they find out I was the doctor, they doctored on me, but the only thing they didn't use no knife. So they gave me the name "Hogman"; I been wearing it off and on and on since."
In 1936 he bought his first guitar and started his own band, playing around Jonesboro, Louisiana. Hogman had one unusual practice in his harmony: he employed polytonality. that is he sang in one key and played in an other.

Francis Hillman "Scrapper" Blackwell
Blackwell was an American blues guitarist and singer, best known as half of the guitar-piano duo he formed with Leroy Carr in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
He was given the nickname "Scrapper" by his grandmother, because of his fiery nature (a person who fights or struggles against something or to do something).
Leroy Carr convinced Blackwell to record with him for Vocalion Records in 1928; the result was "How Long, How Long Blues", the biggest blues hit of that year. Blackwell and Carr toured throughout the American Midwest and South between 1928 and 1935 as stars of the blues circuit, recording over 100 sides. "Prison Bound Blues" (1928), "Mean Mistreater Mama" (1934), and "Blues Before Sunrise" (1934) were popular tracks.

Edward James "Son House" Jr.
House had a long career with many ups and downs and many bumps in the road. He was initially a singer and someone who could tell stories well (which he had learned while working as a preacher and in the Baptist church the guitar was seen as a sinful instrument). In 1964 (at the age of 62) Alan Wilson (Canned Heat) taught him to play the guitar better, which brought him back into the spotlight and took part in European tours.
In his interview with Studs Terkel, House gives no special reason why he is called "Son" when his real first name is Eddie.

Richard "Hacksaw" Harney
Richard was an American Delta blues guitarist and pianist.
Robert Palmer (music journalist): " an exceptional technician whose busy, dense finger-picking style was far removed from the more heavily rhythmic playing of the (Charlie) Patton-House school and who was regarded by many musicians as the best guitarist in the Delta."
Harney formed a guitar playing duo with his brother Maylon. They became known by their family nicknames of Can and Pet. Richard's nickname, Can, was an abbreviation of candy. The loss of his murdered brother Maylon, a speech impediment and naturally shy disposition, were all factors in preventing Harney from achieving fame. He spent most of his working lifetime as an itinerant piano tuner and repairer.
Pinetop Perkins said Harney got his nickname because he always carried a small case filled with the tools of his trade, including a hacksaw.

Richard "Rabbit" Brown
Brown said to have been a small man, and hence his nickname, he was described by a contemporary as something of a clown and not to be taken too seriously.
Songster Richard Brown was one of a group of important artists that preceded the development of acoustic blues during the 1920's. Songsters were musicians who performed material from the older traditions, essentially stories. Originally a "songster" was a songbook but the term became commonly used to denote the singer. (thebluestrail.com)

Roosevelt Thomas "Grey Ghost" Williams
Williams was an American blues pianist, with a 70-year career spanning from the 1920s through the 1990s.
He traveled to the area dances and roadhouses by riding empty boxcars. He would seem to appear out of nowhere and then disappear immediately after performing, which earned him the nickname, "Grey Ghost.

In 1965, archivist Tary Owens recorded several Grey Ghost songs. In 1987 Owens went to see the exhibit, “From Lemon to Lightnin’: An Exhibit of Texas Blues”. His field recordings from the 1960s were prominently displayed, including the barrelhouse blues pianist the Grey Ghost (Roosevelt Williams). Everyone thought that the man was already dead, given his age, but Owens knew he wasn't and brought him back from obscurity. Thus the Ghost became a living 'Grey Ghost". Williams was long retired, but Owens not only issued the 1965 recordings on his Catfish Records label in 1987, but also convinced Williams, now 84, to start playing again and introduced him to a new generation of blues fans. Owens arranged for Williams to make a CD of new recordings at the age of 89.

His nickname, by Roosevelt in his words:
"They said like a ghost I come up out of the ground, and then I was gone," he grinned. "I had come and gone by freight train. I would put overalls over my suit and tie, and that's the way I traveled."

William "Peetie Wheatstraw" Bunch
William was an American musician, an influential figure among 1930s blues singers.
Although he could play the guitar, he played the piano on most of his recordings. He often performed at a club called Lovejoy in the East St. Louis area and at a juke joint over a barbershop on West Biddle Street. For the rest of his life, he was one of the most recorded blues singers and accompanists.
By the time Bunch reached St. Louis, he had discarded his name and crafted a new identity. The name "Peetie Wheatstraw" was described by the blues scholar Paul Oliver as one that had well-rooted folk associations.
All but two of his records were issued under the names "Peetie Wheatstraw, the Devil's Son-in-Law" and "Peetie Wheatstraw, the High Sheriff from Hell".
The blues singer Henry Townsend recalled Wheatstraw: "He was that kind of person. You know, a jive-type person." The blues critic Tony Russell updated the description: "Wheatstraw constructed a macho persona that made him the spiritual ancestor of rap artists.
Peetee died on his 39th birthday in a car accident.

"Shakey Jake" Harris
Harris was an American Chicago blues singer, harmonicist and songwriter. He released five albums over a period of almost 25 years. He was often musically associated with his nephew Magic Sam. His debut recording was the single "Call Me if You Need Me", backed with "Roll Your Moneymaker", in 1958, featuring Magic Sam and Syl Johnson on guitar and produced by Willie Dixon. In late 1960s he recorded "Further On up the Road with Luther Allison.
He also worked as a professional gambler (his nickname came from a dice players' expression, "shake 'em").

Harry Oster
In 1956 he was among the three founders of the Louisiana Folklore Society. In 1959 Oster went with New Orleans jazz historian Richard B. Allen to the Louisiana State Penitentiary, also known as Angola prison, to record African American Blues, Spirituals sung by choirs and soloists, Sermons and personal interviews. The musicians he recorded there for the first time include Robert Pete Williams, Roosevelt Charles, Hogman Maxey, Otis Webster and Robert Guitar Welch.
His effort to record and endear folk arts ensued in Iowa with releasing Folk Voices of Iowa in 1965 and creating the Old Time Fiddlers Picnic with Art Rosenbaum.
Books: Living Country Blues, Penguin Dictionary of American Folklore.
By the end of the 1960s its catalogue was sold to Arhoolie Records.

Studs Terkel
Louis "Studs" Terkel was an American writer, historian, actor, and broadcaster. Terkel received his nickname while he was acting in a play with another person named Louis. To keep the two straight, the director of the production gave Terkel the nickname Studs after the fictional character about whom Terkel was reading at the time — Studs Lonigan, of James T. Farrell's trilogy.
Son House discusses his life and carreer as a blues musician.