 After Oscar Whetsel's death in 1906, his widow married the Reverend Lewis Charles Sheafe (1859-1938), who was the leading African American minister in the Seventh-day Adventist Church during the early twentieth century.Art Whetsel grew up in Los Angeles, California, where he started playing the cornet at the age of eight.In his teens, his family moved to Washington, D.C. where, after playing in a number of bands and stage shows, he became one of the members of Duke Ellington's first band, "The Washingtonians"; and was present, on July 26, 1923 in New York City when The Washingtonians, billed as "Snowden's Novelty Orchestra" with Elmer Snowden on banjo and saxophone, Ellington on piano, Whetsel on trumpet, Sonny Greer on drums and vocals and Toby Hardwick on clarinet made a "trial recording" at the Victor Talking Machine Company; it was Ellington's first visit to a recording studio.