While WYSIWYG contends that Black Gospel music was the wellspring from which flowed the Blues, I believe that the Blues, while owing a debt to both sacred and the "old time" music that was a common culture shared by Blacks and Whites before the Civil War, was a relatively new phenomenon that surfaced in strength around 1900, was formally described by WC Handy, and developed by men like Blind Lemon Jefferson and Son House. Most Blues is only "folk" or "Traditional" in the same sense that Woody and Ledbelly's songs are seen as traditional.