Franklin Rosemont

Archie Green

David Roediger

In 1905, radical labour groups came together to form the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW or Wobblies). The union was a huge presence in the labour movement, and wherever they went, they sang. These songs helped to recruit new memebers to the Wobblies' cause. Originally published in pocket size in The Little Red Songbook, these traditional labour songs are now brought together in their entirety, along with additional songs, rare artwork, personal recollections, discographies and more into this all-embracing Big Red Songbook!

250+ IWW Songs!

The Big Red Songbook

" . . . an impressive collection . . . this book marks a milestone in the study of labor an occupational songs." —Journal of American Folklore "This is an important contribution to Ameican history, saluting those who built the country with their labor." —Come-All-Ye "The remembrances are sensitive and perceptive, the essays are insightful and thought-provoking . . . " —Sonneck Society Bulletin These essays offer striking portraits of working environments where song arose in response to prevailing conditions. Included are the protest blues of African American levee workers, the corridos of Chicano farm workers, and the European songs of immigrant lumber workers in the Midwest.

Songs about Work

In this culmination of his half-century of involvement with American workers and their traditions, Archie Green explores occupational expression - stories, songs, customs, beliefs, artifacts - on the job and in institutions such as trade unions. Combining ethnographic description with analysis drawn from folklore, history, literary criticism, art history, linguistics, and philosophy, Green presents ten case studies in which he reflects on single words as social texts ("Wobbly," "fink") and clustered words within anecdotes, tales, and ballads ("John Henry," Homestead's strike songs, job yarns about cuckoldry and sexual impotence, and pile-driving traditions, for example). Drawing on Green's own experience as a shipwright and carpenter, the book will appeal both to workers curious about their history and traditions and to academicians who study the workforce and labor process.

Laborlore Explorations

Wobblies, Pile Butts, and Other Heroes

Archie Green--shipwright, folklorist, teacher, and lobbyist--was a legendary figure in the field of American folklore and vernacular culture studies. An inspiration to a generation of students and scholars, Green was known for the remarkable passion, intelligence, and curiosity he brought to his explorations of everyday people, their communities, their work, and their forms of expression. This book gathers twelve essays intended to represent the range of Green's writings over forty years. Selections include a study of folk depictions in the art of Thomas Hart Benton, investigations of occupational and labor language, and a contemplative account of personal and political morality in the study of Appalachian musicians. In an afterword, Green traces his career and reflects on the state of folklore as a discipline. Woven through the foreword by Robert Cantwell is Green's biography, key to understanding his unique mix of activism and scholarship.

Torching the Fink Books and Other Essays on Vernacular Culture

This is indeed an incredible endeavor. For sure the most comprehensive collection of rebel workers' songs and poems ever compiled in English. It includes ALL the songs that appeared in the IWW's celebrated "little red songbook" from 1909 through 1973, plus dozens of others that never made it into the songbook. Here are the songs of Joe Hill, T-Bone slim, Dick Brazier, Ralph Chaplin, Covington Hall and other Wobbly legends; lesser knowns, but ought to be legends such as Eugene Barnett, Paul Walker, and Henry Pfaff; for the first time anywhere, a good selection of songs by women Wobblies: Anges Thecla Fair, Laura Payne Emerson, Sophie Fagin, Jane Street, Laura Tanne and others; songwriters from other continents, including Australians Bill Casey and Harry Hooton, the Englishman Leon Rosselson, Germans Ernest Riebe and John Olday, and the Scotsman Douglas Robson. A special section focuses on variants and parodies of IWW songs: a Depression-era version of "Hallelujah I'm a Bum," Jack Langan's 1960s version of "Solidarity Forever," an Earth First! adaptation of Joe Hill's "There is Power" by Walkin' Jim Stoltz, and Hazel Dickens' bold update of "The Rebel Girl." Best of all, perhaps is the wealth of essays, analysis, references, bibliographies, and discographies, provided by Archie Green, his coeditors, and other collaborators, providing not only historical/biographical context, but also a wide range of perspectives on the Wobbly counterculture and its enduring legacies. And there's an afterword by Utah Phillips!

Salvatore Salerno

In 1905, representatives from dozens of radical labor groups came together in Chicago to form One Big Union—the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), known as the Wobblies. The union was a big presence in the labor movement, leading strikes, walkouts, and rallies across the nation. And everywhere its members went, they sang. Their songs were sung in mining camps and textile mills, hobo jungles and flop houses, and anywhere workers might be recruited to the Wobblies’ cause. The songs were published in a pocketsize tome called the Little Red Songbook, which was so successful that it’s been published continuously since 1909. In The Big Red Songbook, the editors have gathered songs from over three dozen editions, plus additional songs, rare artwork, personal recollections, discographies, and more into one big all-embracing book. IWW poets/composers strove to nurture revolutionary consciousness. Each piece, whether topical, hortatory, elegiac, or comic served to educate, agitate, and emancipate workers. A handful of Wobbly numbers have become classics, still sung by labor groups and folk singers. They include Joe Hill’s sardonic “The Preacher and the Slave” (sometimes known by its famous phrase “Pie in the Sky”) and Ralph Chaplin’s “Solidarity Forever.” Songs lost or found, sacred or irreverent, touted or neglected, serious or zany, singable or not, are here. The Wobblies and their friends have been singing for a century. May this comprehensive gathering simultaneously celebrate past battles and chart future goals. In addition to the 250+ songs, writings are included from Archie Green, Franklin Rosemont, David Roediger, Salvatore Salerno, Judy Branfman, Richard Brazier, James Connell, Carlos Cortez, Bill Friedland, Virginia Martin, Harry McClintock, Fred Thompson, Adam Machado, and many more.

Big Red Songbook

Source and Symbol

Hillbilly Music

"Crafted from sheet metal and scraps into likenesses that include clowns, knights, cowboys, and L. Frank Baum's Tin Woodman of Oz, tin men have both utilitarian and aesthetic purposes. Some serve as sheet-metal shops' trade signs or prove an apprentice's competence. Others are coveted in boutiques, antique stores, and folk art museums."--BOOK JACKET.

Archie Green

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