Jack Basham (1882-1946) & Vera Johnson (1907-1991)
John Thomas (‘Jack’) Basham was born and brought up in Holt, North Norfolk and worked as a cabinet maker and carpenter, as did his father and brother. After a brief spell living in Nottingham around the turn of the century, he was back in Norfolk by 1907. In the 1930s he lived on Cromer Road, Sheringham and in later years on Wyndham Street, Sheringham. He performed in a group which played in local pubs and clubs which sometimes involved dressing up in costume and he is known to have played guitar as well as dulcimer.
He made this dulcimer himself around the 1920s. Another carpenter living in Sheringham, John Harrald, also built a dulcimer around the same time, and the two men are believed to have known each other.
The family dulcimer, made by Jack Basham and played by both him and his daughter, was donated to Sheringham Museum in 2005 by Joyce Rowe (Vera Johnson’s daughter), who lived just along the coast in Weybourne until her death in 2013.
Jack’s daughter, Vera Johnson, married yet another carpenter, Walter Johnson, and continued to play her father’s dulcimer. The photo here shows her playing at a Christmas party in 1985. In the dulcimer case was a list of popular song tunes which must have formed part of Vera’s repertoire in later years.
Jack Basham and Vera Johnson’s dulcimer
A diagram of this instrument may be seen on the Dimensions page.
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