Many of the most important recordings in blues history were made at Paramount Records' studio on the grounds of the Wisconsin Chair Company factory in Grafton. Founded by the Wisconsin Chair Company in 1917, Paramount first produced recordings in New York City and later in Chicago, where African American producer J. Mayo Williams supervised many sessions, before opening a studio at this facility in 1929. The label recorded a wide range of music, but became most famous for the blues recordings it began making in 1922, first following the commercial success of female African American blues vocalists such as Mamie Smith by recording performers including Ma Rainey and Ida Cox, and then entering a new phase in 1926 when successful releases by Blind Lemon Jefferson and Blind Blake showed a market for male guitar accompanists. To find talent in the South, Paramount used field agents including H. C. Speir of Jackson, Mississippi, who scouted musicians, made test recordings, and helped arrange northern recording trips. Between 1929 and 1932, Mississippi-born blues pioneers including Charley Patton, Tommy Johnson, Skip James, Son House, the Mississippi Sheiks, Willie Brown, and Henry Townsend traveled north to record here, and Patton alone recorded more than forty songs for the label. Other Mississippi-born artists who recorded for Paramount included Ishmon Bracey and Louise Johnson, and in 1930 Son House traveled with Patton, Willie Brown, and Louise Johnson by car to a historic session in Grafton. As the Great Depression cut record sales, Paramount closed its studio in the summer of 1932, and the factory closed the following year. Paramount later attained legendary status among historians and collectors, while the Grafton Blues Association, founded in 2006, began celebrating that legacy with the first annual Paramount Blues Festival that same year.