Dr. Josiah H. Combs, born in Hazard in 1886, lived here from 1893 to the 1920s and distinguished himself as an educator, a professor of foreign languages at many universities, and a pioneer in research and the preservation of folklore, folk songs, and U.S. dialects. He received a Ph.D. degree from the Sorbonne in Paris in 1925, married Charlotte Benard of France, and began his study of folklore at Hindman Settlement School, where he was one of two students in the first graduating class in 1904. An important collector of American folk music, he gathered mountain ballads and gave recitals from New York to Texas with his 3-string dulcimer. He also had great affected for his fellow mountaineers. His father, John W. Combs, was state senator from 1904 to 1906.