Charles Lafayette "Lafe" Todd (December 9, 1911 – August 4, 2004) was an American folklorist. He was born in

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry typically are describ ...

western

New York State New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. stat ...

. As an undergraduate studying

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...

Hamilton College Hamilton College is a private liberal arts college in Clinton, Oneida County, New York. It was founded as Hamilton-Oneida Academy in 1793 and was chartered as Hamilton College in 1812 in honor of inaugural trustee Alexander Hamilton, following ...

, he developed an interest in the Elizabethan ballad. In the late 1930s, while doing graduate work at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, Todd lived in

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

, where he frequented the

Village Vanguard The Village Vanguard is a jazz club at Seventh Avenue South in Greenwich Village, New York City. The club was opened on February 22, 1935, by Max Gordon. Originally, the club presented folk music and beat poetry, but it became primarily a jazz ...

, a local night spot. Here he made the acquaintance of

Alan Lomax Alan Lomax (; January 31, 1915 – July 19, 2002) was an American ethnomusicologist, best known for his numerous field recordings of folk music of the 20th century. He was also a musician himself, as well as a folklorist, archivist, writer, sch ...

(who later facilitated the

Archive of American Folk Song The Archive of Folk Culture (originally named The Archive of American Folk Song) was established in 1928 as the first national collection of American folk music in the United States of America. It was initially part of the Music Division of the Libr ...

's support of the Todd/Sonkin collecting expedition), along with other notables of the day such as

Woody Guthrie Woodrow Wilson Guthrie (; July 14, 1912 – October 3, 1967) was an American singer-songwriter, one of the most significant figures in American folk music. His work focused on themes of American socialism and anti-fascism. He has inspired ...

Huddie Ledbetter Huddie William Ledbetter (; January 20, 1888 – December 6, 1949), better known by the stage name Lead Belly, was an American folk and blues singer notable for his strong vocals, virtuosity on the twelve-string guitar, and the folk standa ...

(better known as "Leadbelly"),

Burl Ives Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives (June 14, 1909 – April 14, 1995) was an American musician, actor, and author with a career that spanned more than six decades. Ives began his career as an itinerant singer and guitarist, eventually launching his own rad ...

John Jacob Niles John Jacob Niles (April 28, 1892 – March 1, 1980) was an American composer, singer and collector of traditional ballads. Called the "Dean of American Balladeers," Niles was an important influence on the American folk music revival of the 195 ...

, and Frank M. Warner. During the same period, Todd met

Robert Sonkin Robert Sonkin (1910–1980) was an American scholar of speech, language, and music. Life Sonkin was born into an Orthodox Jewish family in the Bronx, New York, on December 25, 1910. Sonkin, who held degrees from City College (CCNY) (now the Ci ...

. They were both working in the Department of Public Speaking at the

City College of New York The City College of the City University of New York (also known as the City College of New York, or simply City College or CCNY) is a public university within the City University of New York (CUNY) system in New York City. Founded in 1847, Cit ...

, where Todd taught for three years. They undertook their documentation in the

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

FSA camps during their summer vacations in 1940 and 1941. In addition to the

ethnographic Ethnography (from Greek ''ethnos'' "folk, people, nation" and ''grapho'' "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject o ...

research Todd did with Sonkin in California, he also documented

folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has b ...

in upstate New York and parts of

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

. In 1942, he returned to California and worked as associate manager of the Tulare Migrant Camp in

Visalia Visalia ( ) is a city in the agricultural San Joaquin Valley of California. The population was 141,384 as per the 2020 census. Visalia is the fifth-largest city in the San Joaquin Valley, the 42nd most populous in California, and 192nd in ...

. During his tenure at Tulare many of the men in camp left to assist in the war effort, either by working in the

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

shipyards A shipyard, also called a dockyard or boatyard, is a place where ships are built and repaired. These can be yachts, military vessels, cruise liners or other cargo or passenger ships. Dockyards are sometimes more associated with maintenance a ...

or by joining the military. He was later drafted into the army and went to work as a public relations officer. After the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Todd continued his career in

public relations Public relations (PR) is the practice of managing and disseminating information from an individual or an organization (such as a business, government agency, or a nonprofit organization) to the public in order to influence their perception. P ...

, including a stint with the State Department doing

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

broadcasts to

Iron Curtain The Iron Curtain was the political boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. The term symbolizes the efforts by the Soviet Union (USSR) to block itself and its s ...

countries. He later went on to become president of an international public relations firm in New York. Ultimately, he became head of the Speech and Communications Department at his alma mater,

. Todd and Sonkin once again undertook a collaborative project during this period, which resulted in a book titled ''

Alexander Bryan Johnson Alexander Bryan Johnson (May 29, 1786, Gosport, Hampshire, Eng. — September 9, 1867, Utica, N.Y., U.S.), was a British-born American philosopher and semanticist. He immigrated to the United States as a child and worked as a banker in Utica, New ...

: Philosophical Banker'', published in 1977. Todd and his wife, Clare, retired to

Vero Beach, Florida Vero Beach is a city in and the seat of Indian River County, Florida, United States. Vero Beach is the second most populous city in Indian River County. Abundant in beaches and wildlife, Vero Beach is located on Florida's Treasure Coast. It is thi ...

References

Library of Congress
{{DEFAULTSORT:Todd, Charles L. 1911 births 2004 deaths People from New York (state) Hamilton College (New York) alumni American folklorists