Paul Oliver
Paul Hereford Oliver MBE (25 May 1927 – 15 August 2017) was an English architectural historian and writer on the blues and other forms of African-American music.[5][6] He initially trained as a painter and sculptor,[7] but because of allergies to some art materials concentrated on graphic design.[8] After a period in the War Office, Oliver gained his Art Teacher's Diploma at Goldsmiths College at the University of London.[4] From the early 1960s, he studied vernacular architecture traditions around the world,[10] particularly stimulated by a trip to Ghana in 1964 to research appropriate housing for people displaced after the building of the Akosombo Dam.[15] He made several trips to the US in the 1960s to interview and record blues musicians, financed by the State Department and the BBC.