Oscar Washington

Oscar Douglas Washington (Feb 18, 1912 – 2004/05) was an American songwriter, guitarist, school teacher and record label owner. He is credited as co-writer of the jazz and rhythm and blues classic "Night Train", and was also influential in the early career of Chuck Berry.

Childhood Washington was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma. His family fled Tulsa during the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.

Career By the early 1950s, Washington was working in St Louis, Missouri as a school teacher and guitarist.

In 1953, he started the small independent Ballad record label in St Louis. After hearing an unrecorded guitarist, Chuck Berry, playing in clubs, he persuaded Berry to make his first record as part of another group, Joe Alexander & the Cubans. They released a calypso record, "Oh Maria", in 1954, which was co-written by Washington. he continued to release occasional records on the Ballad label until the late 1950s.

Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) credits Washington with 70 compositions as a songwriter, including "Night Train".

Death In August 2005, human remains unearthed at a property in St Louis were tentatively identified as those of Oscar Washington, aged 93, who had not been seen for over a year. Police had been looking for his son, Farand Washington, in connection with the cashing of Social Security checks made out to his father. After Farand Washington was killed in a crash when he lost control of his car, and following an anonymous tip-off by a neighbor, police undertook a search of the family's property, where they found the buried remains. It was reported that police believed that the remains were those of Oscar Washington, but an autopsy failed to determine the cause of his death.