Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 2002 Prophet singer: the voice and vision of Woody Guthrie Mark Allan Jackson Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Jackson, Mark Allan, "Prophet singer: the voice and vision of Woody Guthrie" (2002). LSU Doctoral Dissertations. 135. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations/135 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized graduate school editor of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please [email protected]. PROPHET SINGER: THE VOICE AND VISION OF WOODY GUTHRIE A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The Department of English By Mark Allan Jackson B.A., Hendrix College, 1988 M.A., University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, 1995 December 2002 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Many people and institutions should be acknowledged for their help in making my dissertation possible. I have to start off by tipping my hat to certain of my friends, people who first asked me interesting questions or spared with me in argument about music. So I salute Casey Whitt, John Snyder, Cody Walker, Derek Van Lynn, Maxine Beach, and Robin Becker. They helped me see the deep places in America’s music, made me think about its beauty and meaning. At Louisiana State University, I owe many for their efforts. My deepest gratitude goes to Dr. John Lowe and Dr. Frank DeCaro of Louisiana State University for their detailed criticism and unyielding support. Both these scholars challenged my ideas and my writing with sharp comments. Although I claim all faults found here, they helped make this project better than I thought possible. I never doubted their faith in my work. Thank you. I also want to praise the rest of my committee-- Patrick McGee, Carl Freedman, and Pat Marerro--for their efforts. A couple of important archives and their staff have given me much help in my research. I want to give a nod of appreciation to Nora Guthrie and all the others at the Woody Guthrie Archives for their kind assistance and their permission to quote from their materials. The staff at the Library of Congress’ American Folklife Center has also helped guide me in my research into Woody Guthrie and his songs; I owe them much. Much of the research that made this dissertation possible was aided by a fellowship from the Smithsonian Institution (SI) and by the help of certain staff members. In particular, Jeff Place at the Ralph Rinzler Archives in the SI’ Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage gave me guidance through the archive’s Woody Guthrie Collection. I also want to thank the archive as a whole for its kind permission to quote from unpublished materials held there. At the National Museum of American History, both Charley McGovern and Pete Daniels have commented on various sections of this dissertation; they have also helped me immensely simply by being my friends. Needless to say, I want to thank the SI for its overall support. ii Finally, I want to thank my family, who stood by me even when they were not exactly sure what it was I was doing. Now I can finally tell them that “my book” is finished. My father, Lee E. Jackson, gave me a sympathy for working people and their struggles, believing that all labor is a noble effort and worthy of praise. My mother gave me the belief that there was good in the world; all you had to do was look for it. She gave me sympathy for the human condition. Throughout my life, my parents have given me a rock to stand on. They are my church. This book is dedicated to them. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ……………………………………………………………………….. ii ABSTRACT ……………………………………………………………………………………….. v INTRODUCTION GIVING A VOICE TO LIVING SONGS …………………………………………………………1 CHAPTER ONE IS THIS SONG YOUR SONG ANYMORE?: REVISIONING “THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND ……….……………………............................ 13 CHAPTER TWO STORIES OF THE BUSTED, DISGUSTED, DOWN AND OUT: THE BEGINNINGS OF GUTHRIE’S DOCUMENTARY IMPULSE …………………………. 49 CHAPTER THREE THE POOR, HARD-WORKING MAN BLUES: DOCUMENTING AMERICAN WORKERS’ HARDSHIPS ……………………………………102 CHAPTER FOUR SKIN TROUBLE: DOCUMENTING RACE AND REDEMPTION ………………………………………………… 146 CHAPTER FIVE STANDING OUTSIDE THE LAW: MYTH MAKING AND BREAKING IN GUTHRIE’S OUTLAW SONGS …………………….. 194 CHAPTER SIX THAT UNION FEELING: TRACING A VISION OF A BETTER WORLD ………………………………………………… 242 CONCLUSION THIS SCRIBBLING MIGHT STAY ……………………………………………………………... 305 BIBLIOGRAHY …………………………………………………………………………………… 311 VITA ……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 325 iv ABSTRACT This project discusses the cultural and political significance of a number of lyrics by songwriter and political activist Woodrow Wilson “Woody” Guthrie. By drawing on both the singer’s personal experiences and relevant American history, I lay out how larger political and cultural forces at work in society impacted Guthrie’s songs. Although this work focuses primarily on his lyrics, my dissertation also draws on his interviews, commercial recordings, drawings, and other writing. Since much of the writing discussed in this work comes from archival collections at the Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, and the Woody Guthrie archives, I have covered a wider variety of materials concerning Guthrie than ever done before, thus providing new insights into one of America’s most intriguing cultural figures. Also, by using an interdisciplinary approach, I have been able to evaluate Guthrie’s political expression through both a literary and a historical perspective, giving this study a rich and varied context. v INTRODUCTION GIVING A VOICE TO LIVING SONGS At several points in his life, writer and political activist Woodrow Wilson “Woody” Guthrie (July 14, 1912-October 3, 1967) broke the world of song into distinct categories: There are two kinds of songs--living songs and dying songs. The dying songs--the ones about champagne for two and putting on your top hat--they tell you that there’s nothing to be proud of in being a worker, but that someday if you’re good and work hard, you’ll get to be boss. Then you can wear white tie and tails and have songs made up about you. I like living songs that make you take pride in yourself and your work, songs that try to make things better for us, songs that protest all the things that need protesting against.1 Too often, Guthrie believed, a handful of performers in the popular media voiced giddy visions of glamour and romance, a carefree image far removed from the experiences and the history of the majority of the American people listening to their radios and phonographs. Even worse, these few performers created a narrow-focused cacophony that drowned out the voices and visions of thousands of other artists, hungry both literally and figuratively. He complains, electric fonagrafts an radeos an talkies has fixed it to where you put a nickel in an--one or 2 musicians entertains hundreds an thousends of people, an hole armies of well talented folks goes a beggin. Use to be when a musician walked in a saloon he was cinched to make a good stake, 'cause he was welcome. Now days the bartender says "no music wanted--we got Bang Crosby right over there on the electric fonograft--" an the crowd roars. An the musician sleeps under a bridge. Same way with art an poetry an dancin' an everthing else. One or two perferred folks get on the screen or on wax or on the air--and hole flocks go without.2 He saw and heard certain figures, such as Bing Crosby, pushing aside a multitude of other artists. Some of the silenced had a purpose well beyond presenting fantasies of wealth and fame. These were voices of protest, the voices of dissent, including Guthrie’s own. But even while recognizing that some commercialized music, along with other art, was being used to tranquilize the populace, Guthrie also firmly believed that songs could be a powerful force for 1 positive and equitable societal change. He writes, “Music is a weapon, the same as a gun, and can be used by the slave just the same as by the big boss.”3 In his relatively short creative life, from the mid 1930s to the mid 50s, Guthrie wrote thousands of songs. Now, however, we can often only discover his lyrics, while their tune has disappeared, faded into time. Much of the reason for this loss is that he did not know how to write down the notes to which he put his words. As a musician, Guthrie did have some ability. He could play the guitar, the mandolin, the fiddle, the banjo, and the harmonica--although he was no virtuoso on any of these instruments. Using any one of them, he could play hundreds of folksongs and other tunes that he encountered in his far-flung travels throughout America. However, he did not do much in the way of composing his own original music--an admission he made early on in his songwriting career. In his first songbook, Alonzo M. Zilch’s Own Collection of Original Songs and Ballads, he confesses to a process that he would follow for the rest of his life: “At times I cannot decide on a tune to use with my words for a song. Woe is me! I am then forced to use some good old, family style tune that hath already gained a reputation as being liked by the people.”4 Later, he was even more upfront about using others’ tunes.