The Four Freshmen is an American male vocal quartet that blends open-harmonic jazz arrangements with the big band vocal group sounds of The Modernaires, The Pied Pipers, and The Mel-Tones, founded in the barbershop tradition. The singers accompany themselves on guitar, horns, bass, and drums, among other instrumental configurations. The group was founded in 1948 in Indiana and reached its peak popularity in the mid-1950s. The last original member retired in 1993, but the group continues to tour internationally. It has recorded jazz harmonies since its founding in the late 1940s in the halls of the Jordan School of Music at Butler University in Indianapolis. History Early beginnings Brothers Don and Ross Barbour grew up in a musical family in Columbus, Indiana, and had sung with their cousin Bob Flanigan as kids. In 1947, while attending the Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music at Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana, music theory classmate Hal Kratzsch convinced the Barbours that forming a barbershop quartet would be a great source of income, so they formed a barbershop quartet called Hal's Harmonizers. Kratzsch knew from instinct how to sing the bottom part; Don, with his wide vocal range, was tapped to sing the second part; and Ross, a natural baritone, took the third part. To sing the top part, they recruited classmate Marvin Pruitt. They would perform songs like "Sweet Adeline" at fairs and conventions while wearing armbands, exaggerated false mustaches, and waiters' aprons. Bored with the confinement of barbershop chords, and not wanting to give up their income base, they renamed themselves as the Toppers, and experimented with more complex chords and jazz arrangements. At first, the group was influenced by Glenn Miller's quartet, The Modernaires, and Mel Tormé's Mel-Tones, but soon developed its own style of improvised vocal harmony. As the Toppers' popularity grew, Pruitt developed stage fright and resigned. Initially, they replaced him with Ross's girlfriend and future wife Nancy Sue Carson, but feeling that a fourth male voice would be more appropriate for the group's sound, the Barbour brothers contacted Flanigan, who was living in Greencastle, Indiana and had previously been part of a high school quintet singing songs inspired by the Modernaires, to become their new lead singer. In the meantime, they started accompanying themselves with musical instruments: Don, having played guitar through high school and a couple of years in Arabia with the Air Force, on guitar; Ross, first