"Original Rags" (copyrighted March 15, 1899) was an early ragtime medley for piano.

The tune's copyright was registered on March 15, 1899,[1] and it was first published by Carl Hoffman of Kansas City, Missouri.

[2] The original cover page showed an elderly black man picking up rags in front of a ramshackle cabin, and has been interpreted as a double pun, first on the activities of a rag (or junk) picker, and second on a slang term for ragtime, "picking the piano".

[3] The composition has the following musical structure: The rag is not in the sequence "AA BB A CC DD" more typical of Joplin.

[1] Blesh appreciated it as "a charming and auspicious beginning to the life work of the master ragtime composer".