Earl Eugene Scruggs, the most influential and imitated banjo player in the world, was born on January 6, 1924, on a forty-acre cotton farm in the little Flint Hill community of Cleveland County near Shelby, North Carolina. At age four, he began learning to pick his father's open back banjo. At age ten, he advanced to a more complicated three-finger banjo style, using a forward roll he learned from a few older banjo pickers in the region, and that approach carried him through his career. An innovative artist, he loved to share his music, mentor young musicians, and cross musical boundaries, and his contributions solidified his place as an American icon and musical legend.