"Why do you include the word Blues?" That's what that list is about, for those who share my interest. They all performed blues material.

"And what is the significance of the year 1895?" It's a cutoff to get early-born people, for those who share my interest in the early "hillbilly" artists who took up blues. We know songs similar to "Poor Boy, Long Ways From Home" were around in about 1900, so people Samantha Bumgarner's or Tom Darby's age generally could remember how that early blues was performed roughly then better than a Bill Monroe could. Even Charlie Monroe could better than Bill, judging from Charlie's "Red Rocking Chair."

The great majority of people above were pre-Jimmie-Rodgers in style, basically (which is just one issue); almost everyone who played on Rodgers' records or emulated him was born 1897 and later, and he was quite an original as far as blues goes -- other than liking to adopt chunks of idiomatic 1910s blues lyrics.