Today Bob Dylan is one of the most renowned figures in pop-music history -- a groundbreaking songwriter, a much-honored talent, an inscrutable persona. But in 1961 he was just a 19-year-old kid from Minnesota scrambling to make a living in New York's folk clubs. In September 1961, he posed for a portrait with his Gibson acoustic guitar -- around the time that Columbia Records scout John Hammond first met him at a rehearsal. Hammond signed Dylan at the end of September. Dylan's first album was six months away.