Woody Guthrie

Woody Guthrie is one of the most revered and imitated folk singer-songwriters, whose radicalism and itinerant lifestyle remain the stuff of American tall tales. Born in 1912 in Oklahoma, he first learned traditional music through his father, an affluent local politician and real estate agent. After his family suffered a string of tragedies and economic losses in the early 1920s, Guthrie turned to performing music professionally and began to write his own songs, evincing increasingly leftist political leanings. In the mid-’30s, Guthrie left his wife and child in Texas and traveled west, busking along the way; ultimately landing in Los Angeles, he gained attention by performing an assortment of American vernacular songs on the radio. After resettling in New York in 1939, he integrated himself into the city’s folk scene, recording with Alan Lomax, writing for Pete Seeger’s group The Almanac Singers, pursuing odd jobs in radio and film, and penning a column for a communist newspaper. His sensationalized 1943 autobiography, Bound for Glory, would make a large impact on—among many other folk-revival-era acolytes—Bob Dylan. The following year, Guthrie recorded 150-plus tracks for future Folkways Records founder Mo Asch—an essential collection that includes the first taping of Guthrie’s lightly ambivalent nationalistic anthem (and greatest claim to fame) “This Land Is Your Land.” His health began to decline as a result of Huntington’s disease in the ’50s; by the middle of the decade, he was unable to play the guitar. Guthrie spent the last few years of his life in care homes in New Jersey and New York, eventually passing away in a Queens psychiatric hospital in 1967. His son Arlo Guthrie rose to prominence around the time of his father’s death, performing his own folk-inspired originals with an antiestablishment bent.