Notes & Queries – 2025

Fiddling Gopher Addis (or, More on Don Reno Sidemen) In last month’s column, we fielded a query concerning two musicians who worked with Don Reno and Red Smiley in the early 1950s: Chuck and Jay Haney. The Haneys had the distinction of appearing on Reno & Smiley’s first recording session together, on January 15, 1952 (see sidebar). What wasn’t asked about, but which should have been discussed, was the identity of the fifth member of that historic recording session, a fiddler who was known only as Gopher Addis.  Addis was born during the depths of the Great Depression on July 13, 1933. As with several other bluegrass musicians who were born during the Depression (notably Franklin Delano “Frank” Wakefield and Delano Floyd “Del” McCoury) Franklin Delano “Gopher” Addis was named after President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Gopher was never comfortable with the name and during his formative and teen years was known to friends and family as F. D. He later acqui