A native of Muncie, IN, Wheeler Moran worked with Syd Valentine's ten-piece Patent Leather Kids in Indianapolis, IN, during the year 1928 until he and Valentine joined Bernie Young's band at the Wisconsin Roof in Milwaukee. During the late '30s, Moran was known as Doc Wheeler, leader of the Sunset Orchestra, formerly the Sunset Royal Serenaders, the band for which Steve Washington wrote a catchy vocal arrangement of Irving Berlin's Marie; Tommy Dorsey ripped it off and made lots of money off of the routine without paying anything to Steve Washington, who had died in January 1936, or to Doc Wheeler, who struggled to get by even as Dorsey's 1937 recording of Marie, based entirely upon Washington's arrangement, became a lucrative pop hit. Doc Wheeler His Sunset Orchestra made a series of recordings for the Bluebird label in 1941, including How 'Bout That Mess? by trumpeter William Cat Anderson and Sorghum Switch, a catchy melody by Jesse Stone that resurfaced a few years later as Cole Slaw, first sung by Louis Jordan and revisited instrumentally during the 1960s by Lou Donaldson. ~ arwulf arwulf, Rovi