Who is the man on the cover of 'Led Zeppelin IV'? Mystery around 'stick man' solved after 52 years
DEVIZES, WILTSHIRE: The Wiltshire Museum in southwestern England has revealed the long-lost identity of the elderly "Stick Man" who graced the cover of Led Zeppelin's 1971 fourth studio album, ‘Led Zeppelin IV.’ The man in the picture is believed to be a thatcher named Lot Long, or Longyear, who was born in Mere, Wiltshire, in 1823.
He was a widower who lived in a small cottage at the time the photograph was taken. According to the museum, Long passed away in 1893.
How was the photo discovered?
According to The New York Times, Brian Edwards, a visiting research fellow with the Regional History Centre at the University of the West of England, came across a photo album when he was “scouring the internet for new releases at auction houses that might be interesting for his research, which includes the area’s well-known landmark Stonehenge.”
Brian discovered this piece of history in a Victorian photo album called "Reminiscences of a visit to Shaftesbury. Whitsuntide 1892. A present to Auntie from Ernest."
The album held over 100 architectural views and street scenes, along with a few portraits of rural workers, according to the Wiltshire Museum.
It’s believed that while browsing an antique shop in the village of Pangbourne, west of London along the River Thames, Led Zeppelin's frontman Robert Plant and guitarist Jimmy Page stumbled upon the original framed and colorized version of the photograph from the 1800s captured by Ernest Howard Farmer, according to the University of the West of England.
Brian discovered a black and white photograph with the words "A Wiltshire Thatcher" written on it.
He believes it to be the original photo because it has a thumbprint in the corner, Edwards explained on BBC Radio Wiltshire on Wednesday.
As per Edwards, the inscriptions in the album correspond to a partial signature that was discovered on the internet, implying that the photograph was captured by the renowned Victorian photographer, Ernest Howard Farmer.
When Brian came upon the photograph, he told the Times, "There was something familiar about it straight away."
After calling his wife for a "sanity check," they both agreed that it was, in fact, the black-and-white version of the photo that had been used for the best-selling album by the four-man group.
It has been theorized by Edwards that Farmer, who was a photography teacher, utilized the black-and-white image that Edwards discovered to instruct his students on the art of colorization.
The original photo is believed to have been lost for a long time, and now after half a century, it has been rediscovered.
The colored version of the photo was the only element on the album cover of ‘Led Zeppelin IV’. Remarkably, the album cover did not feature any text, including the name of the band.
“Led Zeppelin created the soundtrack that has accompanied me since my teenage years, so I really hope the discovery of this Victorian photograph pleases and entertains Robert, Jimmy and John Paul,” Edwards said.
What did the museum say about this discovery?
Since its 1971 release, 'Led Zeppelin IV' has sold over 37 million copies worldwide and features the band's most iconic song, "Stairway to Heaven."
As a result, the iconic depiction of an elderly gentleman with a weathered countenance and a gray beard, carrying a bundle of hazel twigs on his back while steadying himself with a long stick, gained widespread recognition.
David Dawson, the director of Wiltshire Museum, said: “The ‘Wiltshire Thatcher: a photographic journey through Victorian Wessex’ exhibition will celebrate the work of Ernest Farmer, who today is little known but was a leading figure in the development of photography as an art form.
“Through the exhibition, we will show how Farmer captured the spirit of people, villages and landscapes of Wiltshire and Dorset that were so much of a contrast to his life in London. It is fascinating to see how this theme of rural and urban contrasts was developed by Led Zeppelin and became the focus for this iconic album cover 70 years later.”
The original photograph taken by Farmer will be displayed at Wiltshire Museum next spring, alongside other photographs captured during the Victorian era in the West of England.