Editing Woody Guthrie (section)

===1940s: Building a legacy===

====New York City====
Arriving in New York, Guthrie, known as "the Oklahoma cowboy", was embraced by its folk music community.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.beachamjournal.com/journal/2014/07/woody-guthrie-was-born-102-years-old-today.html|title=After 102 Years, Woody Guthrie's Impact Still As Vital As Ever|website=Frank Beacham's Journal|access-date=January 12, 2018|archive-date=January 12, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180112160146/http://www.beachamjournal.com/journal/2014/07/woody-guthrie-was-born-102-years-old-today.html|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry.php?entry=GU006|title=Guthrie, Woodrow Wilson {{!}} The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture|website=www.okhistory.org|access-date=June 17, 2018}}</ref> For a time, he slept on a couch in [[Will Geer]]'s apartment. Guthrie made his first recordings—several hours of conversation and songs recorded by the folklorist [[Alan Lomax]] for the [[Library of Congress]]—as well as an album, ''[[Dust Bowl Ballads]],'' for [[Victor Records]] in [[Camden, New Jersey]].<ref>{{cite book|page=[https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr/page/174 174]|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref>

{{Listen|filename=Woody Guthrie - This Land.ogg|title="This Land is Your Land"|description=Sample of Woody Guthrie's song, "This Land is Your Land"|format=[[Ogg]]}}

In February 1940, he wrote his most famous song, "[[This Land Is Your Land]]", as a response to what he felt was an overplaying of [[Irving Berlin]]'s "[[God Bless America]]" on the radio. Guthrie thought the lyrics were unrealistic and complacent.<ref>Klein, ''Woody Guthrie'', p.&nbsp;144.</ref> He adapted the melody from an old gospel song, "Oh My Loving Brother", which had been adapted by the country group the [[Carter Family]] for their song "Little Darling Pal Of Mine". Guthrie signed the manuscript with the comment, "All you can write is what you see."<ref name="Ed Cray 2004 165">{{cite book|page=[https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr/page/165 165]|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> Although the song was written in 1940, it was four years before he recorded it for [[Moses Asch]] in April 1944.<ref>Klein, ''Woody Guthrie'', p.&nbsp;287.</ref> Sheet music was produced and given to schools by [[Howie Richmond]] sometime later.<ref>Joe Klein, ''Woody Guthrie'', p.&nbsp;375.</ref>

In March 1940, Guthrie was invited to play at a benefit hosted by the John Steinbeck Committee to Aid Farm Workers, to raise money for migrant workers. There he met the folk singer [[Pete Seeger]], and the two men became good friends.<ref name="Ed Cray 2004 165"/> Seeger accompanied Guthrie back to Texas to meet other members of the Guthrie family. He recalled an awkward conversation with Mary Guthrie's mother, in which she asked for Seeger's help to persuade Guthrie to treat her daughter better.<ref>{{cite book|page=[https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr/page/188 188]|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref>

From April 1940, Guthrie and Seeger lived together in the Greenwich Village loft of sculptor [[Harold Ambellan]] and his fiancée. Guthrie had some success in New York at this time as a guest on [[CBS]]'s radio program ''Back Where I Come From'' and used his influence to get a spot on the show for his friend [[Lead Belly|Huddie "Lead Belly" Ledbetter]]. Ledbetter's Tenth Street apartment was a gathering spot for the musician circle in New York at the time, and Guthrie and Ledbetter were good friends, as they had busked together at bars in Harlem.<ref>{{cite book|pages=194–195|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref>

In November 1941, Seeger introduced Guthrie to his friend the poet [[Charles Olson]], then a junior editor at the fledgling magazine ''[[Common Ground (magazine)|Common Ground]]''. The meeting led to Guthrie writing the article "Ear Players" in the Spring 1942 issue of the magazine. The article marked Guthrie's debut as a published writer in the mainstream media.<ref name="Cray2006">{{cite book|first=Ed|last=Cray|title=Ramblin' Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l5OnliWZY0gC&pg=PA228|access-date=January 30, 2013|date=March 17, 2006|publisher=W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=978-0-393-32736-6|page=241}}</ref>

In September 1940, Guthrie was invited by the Model Tobacco Company to host their radio program ''Pipe Smoking Time''. Guthrie was paid $180 a week, an impressive salary in 1940.<ref name="cray197">{{cite book|page=197|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> He was finally making enough money to send regular payments back to Mary. He also brought her and the children to New York, where the family lived briefly in an apartment on [[Central Park West]]. The reunion represented Woody's desire to be a better father and husband. He said, "I have to set {{sic}} real hard to think of being a dad."<ref name=cray197/> Guthrie quit after the seventh broadcast, claiming he had begun to feel the show was too restrictive when he was told what to sing.<ref name="Cray200">{{cite book|page=200|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> Disgruntled with New York, Guthrie packed up Mary and his children in a new car and headed west to California.<ref>{{cite book|page=199|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref>

Choreographer [[Sophie Maslow]] developed ''[[Folksay]]'' as an elaborate mix of modern dance and ballet, which combined folk songs by Woody Guthrie with text from [[Carl Sandburg]]'s 1936 book-length poem ''[[The People, Yes]]''. The premiere took place in March 1942 at the Humphrey-Weidman Studio Theatre in New York City. Guthrie provided live music for the performance, which featured Maslow and her New Dance Group. Two and a half years later, Maslow brought ''[[Folksay]]'' to early television under the direction of Leo Hurwitz. The same group performed the ballet live in front of [[CBS]] TV cameras. The 30-minute broadcast aired on WCBW, the pioneer CBS television station in New York City (now [[WCBS-TV]]), from 8:15–8:45&nbsp;pm ET on November 24, 1944. Featured were Maslow and the New Dance Group, which included among others Jane Dudley, Pearl Primus, and William Bales. Woody Guthrie and fellow folk singer Tony Kraber played guitar, sang songs, and read text from ''The People, Yes''. The program received positive reviews and was performed on television over WCBW a second time in early 1945.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.tvobscurities.com/2016/10/tales-of-lost-tv-folksay/|title=Tales of Lost TV: Folksay (1944)|first=Robert|last=Jay|date=October 20, 2016|website=Television Obscurities}}</ref>

====Pacific Northwest====
[[File:The Columbia.ogv|alt=A black-and-white image of a river|thumb|Video: In 1941 Guthrie wrote songs for ''The Columbia'', a documentary about the [[Columbia River]] released in 1949. Playing time 21:10.]]

In May 1941, after a brief stay in Los Angeles, Guthrie moved to [[Portland, Oregon]], in the [[Lents, Portland, Oregon|neighborhood of Lents]], on the promise of a job. [[Gunther von Fritsch]] was directing a documentary about the [[Bonneville Power Administration]]'s construction of the [[Grand Coulee Dam]] on the [[Columbia River]], and needed a narrator. Alan Lomax had recommended Guthrie to narrate the film and sing songs onscreen. The original project was expected to take 12 months, but as filmmakers became worried about casting such a political figure, they minimized Guthrie's role. The [[United States Department of the Interior|Department of the Interior]] hired him for one month to write songs about the [[Columbia River]] and the construction of the federal dams for the documentary's soundtrack. Guthrie toured the Columbia River and the Pacific Northwest. Guthrie said he "couldn't believe it, it's a paradise",<ref>{{cite book|page=209|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> which appeared to inspire him creatively. In one month Guthrie wrote 26 songs, including three of his most famous: "[[Roll On, Columbia, Roll On]]", "[[Pastures of Plenty]]", and "[[Grand Coulee Dam (song)|Grand Coulee Dam]]".<ref>Klein, ''Woody Guthrie'', pp.&nbsp;195, 196, 202, 205, 212</ref> The surviving songs were released as ''[[The Columbia River Collection (Woody Guthrie Album)|Columbia River Songs]]''. The film "Columbia" was not completed until 1949 (see below). At the conclusion of the month in Oregon and Washington, Guthrie wanted to return to New York. Tired of the continual uprooting, Mary Guthrie told him to go without her and the children.<ref>{{cite book|page=213|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> Although Guthrie would see Mary again, once on a tour through Los Angeles with the Almanac Singers, it was essentially the end of their marriage. Divorce was difficult, since Mary was a [[Catholic Church|Catholic]], but she reluctantly agreed in December 1943.<ref>{{cite book|page=266|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref>

====Almanac Singers====
{{Main|Almanac Singers}}
[[Image:Woody Guthrie NYWTS.jpg|right|thumb|Woody Guthrie, 1943]]

Following the conclusion of his work in the Northwest, Guthrie corresponded with [[Pete Seeger]] about Seeger's newly formed folk-protest group, the [[Almanac Singers]]. Guthrie returned to New York with plans to tour the country as a member of the group.<ref>Klein, ''Woody Guthrie'', p.192-93,195–231</ref> The singers originally worked out of a loft in New York City hosting regular concerts called "[[hootenanny|hootenannies]]", a word Pete and Woody had picked up in their cross-country travels. The singers eventually outgrew the space and moved into the cooperative Almanac House in [[Greenwich Village]].

Initially, Guthrie helped write and sing what the Almanac Singers termed "peace" songs while the Nazi–Soviet Pact was in effect. After Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union, the group wrote anti-fascist songs. The members of the Almanac Singers and residents of the Almanac House were a loosely defined group of musicians, though the core members included Guthrie, [[Pete Seeger]], [[Millard Lampell]] and [[Lee Hays]]. In keeping with common utopian ideals, meals, chores and rent at the Almanac House were shared. The Sunday hootenannies were good opportunities to collect donation money for rent. Songs written in the Almanac House had shared songwriting credits among all the members, although in the case of "[[Union Maid]]", members would later state that Guthrie wrote the song, ensuring that his children would receive residuals.<ref>{{cite book|page=220|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref>

In the Almanac House, Guthrie added authenticity to their work, since he was a "real" working class Oklahoman. "There was the heart of America personified in Woody ... And for a New York Left that was primarily Jewish, first or second generation American, and was desperately trying to get Americanized, I think a figure like Woody was of great, great importance", a friend of the group, [[Irwin Silber]], would say.<ref>{{cite book|page=216|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> Woody routinely emphasized his working-class image, rejected songs he felt were not in the country blues vein he was familiar with, and rarely contributed to household chores. House member [[Sis Cunningham|Agnes "Sis" Cunningham]], another Okie, would later recall that Woody "loved people to think of him as a real working class person and not an intellectual".<ref>{{cite book|page=231|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> Guthrie contributed songwriting and authenticity in much the same capacity for Pete Seeger's post-Almanac Singers project ''[[People's Songs]]'', a newsletter and booking organization for labor singers, founded in 1945.<ref name="PS1">People's Songs Inc. ''People's Songs Newsletter, Vol 1. No 1.''. 1945. [[Old Town School of Folk Music]] resource center collection.</ref>

====''Bound for Glory''====
Guthrie was a prolific writer, penning thousands of pages of unpublished poems and prose, many written while living in New York City. After a recording session with Alan Lomax, Lomax suggested Guthrie write an autobiography. Lomax thought Guthrie's descriptions of growing up were some of the best accounts he had read of American childhood.<ref>{{cite book|page=201|first=Ed|last=Cray|date=2004|title= Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie|url=https://archive.org/details/ramblinman00edcr|url-access=registration|publisher= W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393047592}}</ref> During this time, Guthrie met Marjorie Mazia (the professional name of Marjorie Greenblatt), a dancer in New York who would become his second wife. Mazia was an instructor at the [[Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance|Martha Graham Dance School]], where she was assisting [[Sophie Maslow]] with her piece ''Folksay''. Based on the folklore and poetry collected by [[Carl Sandburg]], ''Folksay'' included the adaptation of some of Guthrie's ''Dust Bowl Ballads'' for the dance.<ref name=Cray200/> Guthrie continued to write songs and began work on his autobiography. The end product, [[Bound for Glory (book)|''Bound for Glory'']], was completed with editing assistance by Mazia and was first published by E.P. Dutton in 1943.<ref>Amazon.com. [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0007E0CZ2 ''Bound for Glory'' (Unknown Binding).] Retrieved November 27, 2007.</ref> It is told in the artist's down-home dialect. The ''Library Journal'' complained about the "too careful reproduction of illiterate speech". However, Clifton Fadiman, reviewing the book in ''[[The New Yorker]]'', remarked that "Someday people are going to wake up to the fact that Woody Guthrie and the ten thousand songs that leap and tumble off the strings of his music box are a national possession, like [[Yellowstone]] and [[Yosemite]], and part of the best stuff this country has to show the world."<ref>Isserman, Maurice [https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2004-01-18-0401170325-story.html "Life of Woody Guthrie is thorough, if unoriginal"], ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'', Chicago, January 18, 2004. Retrieved on March 9, 2021.</ref>

This book was the inspiration for the movie ''[[Bound for Glory (1976 film)|Bound for Glory]]'', starring [[David Carradine]], which won the 1976 [[Academy Award for Original Music Score]] for Original Song Score and Its Adaptation or Adaptation Score, and the [[National Board of Review Award for Best Actor]], among other accolades.

In 1944, Guthrie met [[Moses Asch|Moses "Moe" Asch]] of [[Folkways Records]], for whom he first recorded "This Land Is Your Land". Over the next few years, he recorded "[[Worried Man Blues]]", along with [[Woody Guthrie discography#1944 & 1945, The Asch Recordings|hundreds of other songs]]. These recordings would later be released by Folkways and Stinson Records, which had joint distribution rights.<ref>Klein, ''Woody Guthrie'', p.&nbsp;417.</ref> The Folkways recordings are available (through the [[Smithsonian Institution]] online shop); the most complete series of these sessions, culled from dates with Asch, is titled ''[[The Asch Recordings (Woody Guthrie Album)|The Asch Recordings]]''.