Paul Clayton

Folk singer Paul Clayton smiles for the camera, posing with his guitar while holding a cigarette, a lute hanging on the wall behind him. While studying at the University of Virginia in the early 1950s, Clayton (then known as Paul Worthington, Clayton was his stage name) studied folklore and ballads with Arthur Kyle Davis Jr., the archivist of the Virginia Folklore Society. Clayton became a successful folk musician in his own right, performing on guitar, lute, and Appalachian dulcimer. He recorded over a dozen albums of traditional and original folk music before his death by suicide in 1967 at the age of thirty-six.