![John-avery-lomax1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/John-avery-lomax1.jpg)
John Avery Lomax (September 23, 1867 – January 26, 1948) was an American teacher, a pioneering
musicologist, and a
folklorist
Folklore studies, less often known as folkloristics, and occasionally tradition studies or folk life studies in the United Kingdom, is the branch of anthropology devoted to the study of folklore. This term, along with its synonyms, gained currenc ...
who did much for the preservation of American
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 ...
. He was the father 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 ...
,
John Lomax Jr.
John A. Lomax Jr. (June 14, 1907 – December 12, 1974) was an American folklorist, performer, and land developer. He co-founded the Houston Folklore & Music Society and contributed to the preservation and publication of folklore and folk music ...
and
Bess Lomax Hawes, also distinguished collectors of folk music.
Early life
The Lomax family originally came from
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
with William Lomax, who settled in
Rockingham County in what was then "the colony of North Carolina." John Lomax was born in
Goodman in
Holmes County in central
Mississippi
Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...
, to James Avery Lomax and the former Susan Frances Cooper.
In December 1869, the Lomax family traveled by
ox cart
A bullock cart or ox cart (sometimes called a bullock carriage when carrying people in particular) is a two-wheeled or four-wheeled vehicle pulled by oxen. It is a means of transportation used since ancient times in many parts of the world. They ...
from Mississippi to Texas. John Lomax grew up in central
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
, just north of
Meridian
Meridian or a meridian line (from Latin ''meridies'' via Old French ''meridiane'', meaning “midday”) may refer to
Science
* Meridian (astronomy), imaginary circle in a plane perpendicular to the planes of the celestial equator and horizon
* ...
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 ...
Bosque County
Bosque County ( ) is a county located on the Edwards Plateau in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 census, the population was 18,235. Its county seat is Meridian, while Clifton is the largest city and the cultural/financial center of th ...
.
[Porterfield, p. 10.] His father raised
horse
The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...
s and
cattle
Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult mal ...
and grew
cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...
and
corn
Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...
on the of bottomland that he had purchased near the Bosque River.
[Porterfield, p. 12.] He was exposed to
cowboy
A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the '' vaquer ...
songs as a child.
[Porterfield, p. 18–19.] At around nine he befriended Nat Blythe, a former slave hired as a farmhand by James Lomax. The friendship, he wrote later, "perhaps gave my life its bent."
[Porterfield, p. 20.] Lomax, whose own schooling was sporadic because of the heavy farmwork he was forced to do, taught Blythe to read and write, and Blythe taught Lomax songs including "Big Yam Potatoes on a Sandy Land" and dance steps such as "
Juba". When Blythe was 21 years old, he took his savings and left. Lomax never saw him again and heard rumors that he had been murdered. For years afterward, he always looked for Nat when he traveled around the South.
When he was about to turn twenty-one, and his legal obligation to work as apprentice on his father's farm was coming to an end, his father permitted him to take the profits from the crops of one of their fields. Lomax used this, along with the money from selling his favorite pony, to pay to further his education. In the fall of 1887, he attended Granbury College in
Granbury[Porterfield, p. 22.] and in May 1888, he graduated and eventually became a teacher. He began his first job as a teacher at a country school in
Clifton
Clifton may refer to:
People
*Clifton (surname)
*Clifton (given name)
Places
Australia
* Clifton, Queensland, a town
**Shire of Clifton
*Clifton, New South Wales, a suburb of Wollongong
*Clifton, Western Australia
Canada
*Clifton, Nova Scotia ...
, southeast of Meridian.
[Porterfield, p. 25.] As time went on, he grew tired of the low pay and country-school drudgery and he applied for work at
Weatherford College in
Weatherford in
Parker County in the spring of 1889. He was hired as principal by the school's new president, David Switzer, who had previously been president of Granbury College until it was closed down and he was transferred to Weatherford.
[Porterfield, p. 26.] In 1890, after having attended a summer course at Eastman Business College in
Poughkeepsie, New York
Poughkeepsie ( ), officially the City of Poughkeepsie, separate from the Town of Poughkeepsie around it) is a city in the U.S. state of New York. It is the county seat of Dutchess County, with a 2020 census population of 31,577. Poughkeepsi ...
, Lomax returned to Texas where he became head of the Business Department of Weatherford College.
[Porterfield, p. 27–29.] Each summer, between 1891 and 1894, he also attended the annual lecture-and-concert series at New York State's
Chautauqua Institute, which pioneered adult education (and where Lomax himself would later lecture). According to Porterfield, "There he improved his mathematics, struggled with Latin, listened to music that stirred him (opera and oratorios, light 'classics' of the day), and learned, for the first time, of two poets—
Tennyson and
Browning—whose work would soon become an integral part of his intellectual equipment."
Early career
Lomax decided to further his education at a first-rate university. His first choice was
Vanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and rail magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school its initial $1-million ...
in
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the List of muni ...
, but he realized he would likely fail its tough entrance examinations.
[Porterfield, p. 32.] So, in 1895, at the age of 28, Lomax matriculated at the
University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
, majoring in
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 ...
, and undertaking almost a double course load (including Greek, Latin, and Anglo Saxon) and was graduated in two years. With a touch of Texas hyperbole, he later wrote:
Never was there such a hopeless hodge-podge, There was I, a Chautauqua-educated country boy who couldn't conjugate an English verb or decline a pronoun, attempting to master three other languages at the same time. ... But I plunged on through the year, for since I was older than the average freshman, I must hurry, hurry, hurry. I don't think I ever stopped to think how foolish it all was.[Porterfield, p. 34.][Porterfield, p. 40–41.]
In his memoir, ''Adventures of a Ballad Hunter'', Lomax recounts how he had arrived at the University of Texas with a roll of cowboy songs he had written down in childhood. He showed them to an English professor, Morgan Callaway, only to have them discounted as "cheap and unworthy," prompting Lomax to take the bundle behind the men's dormitory and burn it. His interest in folksongs thus rebuffed, Lomax focused his attentions on more acceptable academic pursuits.
[Porterfield, p. 59–60.] He joined the fraternity
Phi Delta Theta
Phi Delta Theta (), commonly known as Phi Delt, is an international secret and social fraternity founded at Miami University in 1848 and headquartered in Oxford, Ohio. Phi Delta Theta, along with Beta Theta Pi and Sigma Chi form the Miami Triad ...
and the Rusk Literary Society, as well as becoming an editor and later the editor-in-chief of the ''University of Texas Magazine''.
[Porterfield, p. 41.] During the summer of 1896, he attended a summer school program in Chicago studying languages.
[Porterfield, p. 43.] In 1897, he became an associate editor of the ''Alcalde'', a student newspaper.
[Porterfield, p. 45.] After graduation in June 1897, he worked at the University of Texas as registrar for the next six years until the spring of 1903.
[Porterfield, p. 50.][Porterfield, p. 68.] He also had other duties such as being personal secretary to the President of the University, manager of Brackenridge Hall (the men's dormitory on campus), and serving on the Alumni Scholarship Committee.
[Porterfield, p. 71–72.] Lomax joined a campus fraternity known as The Great and Honorable Order of Gooroos receiving the title "Sybillene Priest".
[Porterfield, p. 73.]
Sometime around July 1898 Lomax began an intense relationship with Shirley Green of
Palestine, Texas
Palestine ( ) is a city in and the seat of Anderson County in the U.S. state of Texas. It was named for Palestine, Illinois, by preacher Daniel Parker, who had migrated from that town.
The city had a 2020 U.S. census population of 18,544, mak ...
, to whom he had been introduced in 1897 by the president of the University of Texas.
[Porterfield, p. 53–66.][Porterfield, p. 75–77.] For four years, their friendship had its ups and downs, until June 1902, when Lomax met one of Green's acquaintances, Bess Baumann Brown from
Dallas
Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
.
[Porterfield, p. 79–80.] It ultimately emerged that the reason for Green's reluctance to commit herself to an engagement to John Lomax had been her awareness that she was mortally ill with tuberculosis.
[Porterfield, p. 62–66.] However, Lomax continued to exchange letters with Green until a month before her death, which occurred in February 1903.
[Porterfield, p. 83.] That year, Lomax accepted an offer to teach English at
Texas A&M University
Texas A&M University (Texas A&M, A&M, or TAMU) is a public, land-grant, research university in College Station, Texas. It was founded in 1876 and became the flagship institution of the Texas A&M University System in 1948. As of late 2021, T ...
beginning in September
[Porterfield, p. 87.] To bolster his credentials, in the meantime, he decided to enroll at the University of Chicago for a summer course.
[Porterfield, p. 89.] Upon his return to Texas he became engaged to Bess Brown and they married on June 9, 1904, in
Austin
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...
.
[Porterfield, p. 94–95.][Porterfield, p. 100.] The couple settled down at
College Station
College station or College Station may refer to:
Transportation
*College station (MetroLink), a St. Louis light rail station in Saint Clair County, Illinois, United States
*College station (PNR), a Philippine National Railways station in Los Baño ...
near the A&M campus.
[Porterfield, p. 101.] Their first child, Shirley, was born on August 7, 1905.
[Porterfield, p. 105.]
Lomax, aware of the deficiencies of his early education, still wished to improve himself, however, and on September 26, 1906, he jumped at the chance to attend
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as a graduate student, having previously received a $500 stipend: The Austin Teaching Fellowships.
[Porterfield, p. 106–108.] Here he had the opportunity to study under
Barrett Wendell and
George Lyman Kittredge
George Lyman Kittredge (February 28, 1860 – July 23, 1941) was a professor of English literature at Harvard University. His scholarly edition of the works of William Shakespeare was influential in the early 20th century. He was also involved i ...
, two renowned scholars who actively encouraged his interest in cowboy songs.
[Porterfield, p. 114.] Harvard, in fact, was the center of American folklore studies (then viewed as a subsidiary of English literature, itself a novel field of scholarship in comparison with the more traditional study of rhetoric focused on classical languages and geared to preparing lawyers and clergy). Kittredge, in addition to being a well-known scholar of
Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for '' The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He w ...
and
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
, had inherited the professorship in English literature previously held by
Francis James Child
Francis James Child (February 1, 1825 – September 11, 1896) was an American scholar, educator, and folklorist, best known today for his collection of English and Scottish ballads now known as the Child Ballads. Child was Boylston professor of r ...
, whose courses he continued to teach and whose great, unfinished eight-volume edition of the
''Popular Ballads of England and Scotland'' he brought to completion.
It was Kittredge who pioneered modern methods of ballad study, and who encouraged collectors to get out of their armchairs and library halls and to get out into the countryside to collect ballads first hand. When he met John Lomax in 1907, this was what he encouraged him to do; the cowboy songs Lomax had been writing down were glimpses into a whole new world, and Lomax should follow up on his work. "Go and get this material while it can be found," he told the young Texan. "Preserve the words and music. That's your job."
Wendell and Kittredge continued to play an important advisory role in Lomax's career after he returned to Texas in June 1907 to resume his teaching position at A&M after completing his
Master of Arts
A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...
degree. This included a visit by the two professors to Texas during which Lomax took them to a Sunday service in an African-American church.
Soon after his return to Austin, John Lomax's son, John Jr.,
[ Retrieved on 24 November 2014] was born, on June 14, 1907.
[Porterfield, p. 123.][Porterfield, p. 127.] Galvanized by Kittredge's advice and support, Lomax had begun collecting cowboy songs and ballads, but his work was interrupted on February 7, 1908, when "The Great A&M Strike" broke out. The strike, caused by student dissatisfaction with the administration,
[Porterfield, p. 131.] continued even after February 14, 1908, when the University, in a conciliatory gesture, fired some of its administrators. Unable to teach because of the strike, Lomax decided to see about resuming his collecting of cowboy ballads with a view to publishing them in a book. Encouraged by Wendell, he applied for and was awarded a Sheldon Fellowship grant.
[Porterfield, p. 140.] In June 1908, Lomax became a full professor at A&M. That August the strike ended when the President of the University resigned.
[Porterfield, p. 133–135.] In June 1910, Lomax accepted an administrative job at the University of Texas as "Secretary of the University Faculties and Assistant Director of the Department of Extension."
[Porterfield, p. 147.]
In November 1910 the
anthology
In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs or excerpts by different authors.
In genre fiction, the term ''anthology'' typically categ ...
, ''Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads'', was published by Sturgis and Walton, with an introduction by former president
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
. Among the songs included were "Jesse James", "The Old Chisholm Trail", "Sweet Betsy From Pike", and "
The Buffalo Skinners
''The Buffalo Skinners'' is the sixth studio album by the Scottish band Big Country, which was released in 1993. Two songs, "We're Not In Kansas" and "Ships", are re-recordings of songs from their previous album. The difference is more noticeab ...
" (which George Lyman Kittredge considered "one of the greatest western ballads" and which was praised for its Homeric quality by
Carl Sandburg
Carl August Sandburg (January 6, 1878 – July 22, 1967) was an American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor. He won three Pulitzer Prizes: two for his poetry and one for his biography of Abraham Lincoln. During his lifetime, Sandburg ...
and
Virgil Thomson.)
[Lomax, ''Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads'', p. xxi.] From the first, John Lomax insisted on the inclusiveness of American culture. Some of the most famous songs in the book — "Git Along Little Dogies", "Sam Bass," and "
Home on the Range" — were sourced from African-American cowboys. Before ''Home on the Range'' was published Lomax recorded a black saloon keeper in
San Antonio
("Cradle of Freedom")
, image_map =
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, subdivision_name1 = Texas
, s ...
singing it on an
Edison cylinder.
''Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads'' emerged as a major collection of Western songs and had "a profound effect on other folk song students.".
[Wolfe and Lornell (1999), p. 109.] According to noted folklore scholar, D. K. Wilgus, the book's publication "sparked a great surge of interest in folk songs of all kinds, and in fact, inspired a search for folk material in all regions of the nation." Its success transformed John A. Lomax into a nationally known figure.
[Porterfield, pp.;150–52.][Porterfield, p. 157.]
Texas Folklore Society
Around the same time, Lomax and Professor
Leonidas Payne Leonidas Warren Payne Jr. (July 12, 1873 – June 16, 1945) was an American linguist and professor of English at the University of Texas. He was a co-founder of the Texas Folklore Society along with John Lomax, edited the first anthology of Tex ...
of the
University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
co-founded the
Texas Folklore Society, following Kittredge's suggestion that Lomax establish a Texas branch of the
American Folklore Society
The American Folklore Society (AFS) is the US-based professional association for folklorists, with members from the US, Canada, and around the world, which aims to encourage research, aid in disseminating that research, promote the responsible ...
. Lomax and Payne hoped that the society would further their own research while kindling an interest in folklore among like-minded Texans. On
Thanksgiving Day, 1909, Lomax nominated Payne as president of the society, and Payne nominated Lomax as first secretary. The two set out to marshal support, and a month later, Killis Campbell, an associate professor at the University, publicly proposed the formation of the Society at a meeting of the Texas State Teachers Association in
Dallas
Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
.
[Porterfield, p. 141.] By April 1910, there were 92 charter members.
Lomax then used his prestige as a nationally known author to travel the country raising money for folklore studies and to establish other state folklore societies. "He was among the first scholars to present papers about American folk songs to the
Modern Language Association
The Modern Language Association of America, often referred to as the Modern Language Association (MLA), is widely considered the principal professional association in the United States for scholars of language and literature. The MLA aims to "st ...
, the nation's leading organization of teachers of languages and literature. For the next several years he hit the lecture circuit, traveling so often that his wife, Bess Brown, had to help him with his schedules and even some of his speeches."
His lectures on cowboy songs, ballads and poetry took him all across the eastern USA.
[Porterfield, p. 176–179.] For example, in December 1911, Lomax made a successful performance at Cornell University, singing and reciting some of the cowboy songs he had collected.
[Porterfield, p. 143–144.] Sometimes he would have a chorus of college students dress up as cowboys to add interest to his presentations.
Lomax's abiding interest in African-American folklore was also in evidence, for he had plans to publish another book within a year that consisted of folk songs collected from African-Americans. Although the book failed to materialize, he did publish (in the ''Journal of American Folklore'', December 1912) "Stories of an African Prince", a collection of 16 African stories, which he had obtained through his correspondence with a young Nigerian student, Lattevi Ajayi.
[Porterfield, p. 171–173.] In 1912, with the backing of Kittredge, John A. Lomax was elected president of the
American Folklore Society
The American Folklore Society (AFS) is the US-based professional association for folklorists, with members from the US, Canada, and around the world, which aims to encourage research, aid in disseminating that research, promote the responsible ...
, with Kittredge (himself a former president of the society) as First Vice President. He was re-elected for a second term in 1913. In 1922,
J. Frank Dobie
James Frank Dobie (September 26, 1888 – September 18, 1964) was an American folklorist, writer, and newspaper columnist best known for his many books depicting the richness and traditions of life in rural Texas during the days of the open rang ...
became secretary-treasurer of the Texas Folklore Society, a job he was to hold for 21 years.
Lomax's second son (and third child), Alan, was born on January 15, 1915. In time,
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 ...
would prove a worthy successor of his father. A second daughter,
Bess, was born in 1921, and she too had a distinguished career, both as a performer and teacher.
The Texas Folklore Society grew gradually over the next decade, with Lomax steering it forward. At his invitation, Kittredge and Wendell attended its meetings. Other early members were
Stith Thompson
Stith Thompson (March 7, 1885 – January 10, 1976) was an American folklorist: he has been described as "America's most important folklorist".
He is the "Thompson" of the Aarne–Thompson–Uther Index, which indexes folktales by type, and the ...
and
J. Frank Dobie
James Frank Dobie (September 26, 1888 – September 18, 1964) was an American folklorist, writer, and newspaper columnist best known for his many books depicting the richness and traditions of life in rural Texas during the days of the open rang ...
, who both began teaching English at the university in 1914. In 1915, at Lomax's recommendation, Stith Thompson became the society's secretary-treasurer. In 1916, Lomax's voluminous encyclopedia
''The Book of Texas'' which he had written jointly wit
Harry Yandall Benedict was published. The same year, Stith Thompson edited the first volume of the ''Publications of the Texas Folklore Society'', which Dobie reissued as ''Round the Levee'' in 1935. This publication exemplified the society's express purpose, and the motivation behind Lomax's own work: to gather a body of folklore before it disappeared, and to preserve it for the analysis of later scholars. These early efforts foreshadowed what would become Lomax's greatest achievement, the collection of more than ten thousand recordings for 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 ...
at the
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...
. In the inaugural issue of the ''Publications of the Texas Folklore Society'', John A. Lomax urged the collection of Texas folklore: "Two rich and practically unworked fields in Texas are found in the large Negro and Mexican populations of the state." He adds, "Here are many problems of research that lie close at hand, not buried in musty tomes and incomplete records, but in vital human personalities."
[Lomax, "Unexplored Treasures of Texas Folk-Lore", pp. 101–102. The Texas Folklore Society also sought to collect and preserve the folklore and dialects of other non-English-speaking inhabitants of Texas.]
Throughout the next seven years he continued his research and lecture tours assisted and encouraged by his wife and children. All this came to an end on July 16, 1917, however, when Lomax was fired along with six other faculty members as the result of a political battle between
Governor
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
James E. Ferguson
James Edward Ferguson Jr. (August 31, 1871 – September 21, 1944), known as Pa Ferguson, was an American Democratic politician and the 26th Governor of Texas, in office from 1915 to 1917. He was indicted and impeached during his second term, ...
and the University President, Dr. R. E. Vinson. Lomax moved to
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
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, coordinates =
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, subdivision_name ...
to take a job selling bonds at Lee, Higginson & Co; a bond brokerage firm run by the son of his old professor Barrett Wendell. A few months later, Ferguson was impeached and the Board of Regents rescinded its dismissal of the faculty. Lomax judged that it would be wrong to leave his post at Lee, Higginson & Co so soon after arriving, especially with regards to his friendship with the family of Barrett Wendell, so he remained in Chicago for eighteen months until the war ended. There he struck up a what turned out to be a lifelong friendship with Chicago poet
Carl Sandburg
Carl August Sandburg (January 6, 1878 – July 22, 1967) was an American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor. He won three Pulitzer Prizes: two for his poetry and one for his biography of Abraham Lincoln. During his lifetime, Sandburg ...
, who frequently mentions him in his book, ''American Songbag'' (1927). In 1919, his next book, ''Songs of the Cattle Trail and Cow Camp'', an anthology of cowboy poetry, was published by Macmillan. That year Lomax returned to Texas to be secretary of the Texas Exes, which had become financially independent of the University, so as to avoid further interference from politicians. Nevertheless, interference struck, when Ferguson, whom the law prohibited from holding office, ran his wife,
Miriam A. Ferguson
Miriam Amanda Wallace "Ma" Ferguson (June 13, 1875 – June 25, 1961) was an American politician who served two non-consecutive terms as the governor of Texas: from 1925 to 1927, and from 1933 to 1935. She was the first female governor of Texas, ...
, as his surrogate. As governor, Mrs. Ferguson was able to pack the board of regents and oust John from his job as editor of ''The Alcade'', which during his tenure was a 100-page long publication. Seeing how the wind was blowing, Lomax resigned his secretaryship and joined the Republic Bank of Dallas in 1925. The economic crash of 1929 presaged bad things for the bank, however.
Archive of American Folk Song
In 1931, Lomax's wife Bess Brown died at the age of 50, leaving four children (the youngest, Bess, was ten years old). In addition, the Dallas bank at which Lomax worked failed: he had to phone his customers one by one to announce that their investments were all worthless. In debt and unemployed and with two school-age children to support, the sixty-five-year-old went into a deep depression. In hope of reviving his father's spirits, his oldest son, John Lomax Jr. encouraged him to begin a new series of lecture tours. They took to the road, camping out by the side of the road to save money, with John Jr. (and later
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 ...
) serving the senior Lomax as driver and personal assistant. In June 1932, they arrived at the offices of the
Macmillan publishing company
Macmillan Publishers (occasionally known as the Macmillan Group; formally Macmillan Publishers Ltd and Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC) is a British publishing company traditionally considered to be one of the 'Big Five' English language publi ...
in
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 ...
. Here Lomax proposed his idea for an anthology of American
ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads derive from the medieval French ''chanson balladée'' or ''ballade'', which were originally "dance songs". Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and ...
s and folksongs, with a special emphasis on the contributions of African Americans. It was accepted. In preparation he traveled to
Washington
Washington commonly refers to:
* Washington (state), United States
* Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States
** A metonym for the federal government of the United States
** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered on ...
to review the holdings in 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 ...
of the Library of Congress.
By the time of Lomax's arrival, the Archive already contained a collection of commercial
phonograph
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
recordings that straddled the boundaries between commercial and folk, and wax cylinder field recordings, built up under the leadership of
Robert Winslow Gordon
Robert Winslow Gordon (September 2, 1888 – March 26, 1961) was an American academic, known as a collector of folk songs.
Gordon was educated at Harvard University. He joined the English faculty at the University of California at Berkeley in 19 ...
, Head of the Archive, and
Carl Engel
Carl Engel (July 21, 1883 – May 6, 1944) was a France, French-born United States, American pianist, composer, musicologist and publisher from Paris. He was also president of G. Schirmer, Inc., a writer on music for The Musical Quarterly, a ...
, chief of the Music Division. Gordon had also experimented in the field with a portable disc recorder, but had had neither time nor resources to do significant fieldwork. Lomax found the recorded holdings of the Archive woefully inadequate for his purposes. He therefore made an arrangement with the Library whereby it would provide recording equipment, obtained for it by Lomax through private grants, in exchange for which he would travel the country making field recordings to be deposited in the Archive of the Library, then the major resource for printed and recorded material in the United States
After the departure of Robert Gordon from the Library in 1934, John A. Lomax was named Honorary Consultant and Curator of the Archive of American Folk Song, a title he held until his death in 1948. His work, for which he was paid a
salary of one dollar, included fund raising for the Library, and he was expected to support himself entirely through writing books and giving lectures. Lomax secured grants from the
Carnegie Corporation and the
Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The second-oldest major philanthropic institution in America, after the Carneg ...
, among others, for continued field recordings. He and Alan recorded Spanish ballads and ''
vaquero
The ''vaquero'' (; pt, vaqueiro, , ) is a horse-mounted livestock herder of a tradition that has its roots in the Iberian Peninsula and extensively developed in Mexico from a methodology brought to Latin America from Spain. The vaquero became t ...
'' songs on the
Rio Grande
The Rio Grande ( and ), known in Mexico as the Río Bravo del Norte or simply the Río Bravo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the southwestern United States and in northern Mexico.
The length of the Rio G ...
border and spent weeks among French-speaking
Cajuns in southern
Louisiana
Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
.
Thus began a ten-year relationship with the Library of Congress that would involve not only John but the entire Lomax family, including his second wife,
Ruby Terrill Lomax
Ruby Terrill Lomax (1886 – December 28, 1961) was an American educator and folklorist, who worked with her husband John A. Lomax to collect American folk songs, campaigned for women's education, and was Dean of Women at University of Texas at ...
, Professor of Classics and Dean of Women at the University of Texas, whom he married in 1934. His sons and daughters assisted with his folksong research and with the daily operations of the Archive: Shirley, who performed songs taught to her by her mother; John Jr., who encouraged his father's association with the Library;
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 accompanied John on field trips and who from 1937 to 1942 served as the Archive's first paid (though very nominally) employee as Assistant in Charge; and Bess, who spent her weekends and school vacations copying song texts and doing comparative song research.
Field recordings
Through a grant from the
American Council of Learned Societies
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
, Lomax was able to set out in June 1933 on the first recording expedition under the Library's auspices, with Alan Lomax (then eighteen years old) in tow. As now, a disproportionate percentage of African American males were held as prisoners. Robert Winslow Gordon, Lomax's predecessor at the Library of Congress, had written (in an article in ''The New York Times'', c. 1926) that, "Nearly every type of song is to be found in our prisons and penitentiaries" Folklorists Howard Odum and Guy Johnson also had observed that, "If one wishes to obtain anything like an accurate picture of the workaday Negro he will surely find his best setting in the chain gang, prison, or in the situation of the ever-fleeing fugitive." But what these folklorists had merely recommended John and Alan Lomax were able to put into practice. In their successful grant application they wrote, following Odum, Johnson and Gordon's hint, that prisoners, "Thrown on their own resources for entertainment ... still sing, especially the long-term prisoners who have been confined for years and who have not yet been influenced by
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
and the
radio
Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...
, the distinctive old-time
Negro
In the English language, ''negro'' is a term historically used to denote persons considered to be of Black African heritage. The word ''negro'' means the color black in both Spanish and in Portuguese, where English took it from. The term can be ...
melodies." They toured
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
prison farms recording
work songs
A work song is a piece of music closely connected to a form of work, either sung while conducting a task (usually to coordinate timing) or a song linked to a task which might be a connected narrative, description, or protest song.
Definitions and ...
,
reels,
ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads derive from the medieval French ''chanson balladée'' or ''ballade'', which were originally "dance songs". Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and ...
s, and
blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...
from
prison
A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correc ...
ers such as
James "Iron Head" Baker, Mose "Clear Rock" Platt, and
Lightnin' Washington
Lightning is an atmospheric discharge of electricity.
Lightning or Lightnin may also refer to:
Computing
* Lightning (connector), a power and data bus for Apple iPhone, iPod, and iPad products
* Lightning (software), an extension that adds ca ...
. By no means were all of those whom the Lomaxes recorded imprisoned, however: in other communities, they recorded K.C. Gallaway and Henry Truvillion.
In July 1933, they acquired a state-of-the-art,
phonograph
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
uncoated-aluminum disk recorder. Installing it in the trunk of his
Ford sedan, Lomax soon used it to record, at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, a twelve-string guitar player by the name of
Huddie Ledbetter, better known as "Lead Belly," whom they considered one of their most significant finds. During the next year and a half, father and son continued to make disc recordings of musicians throughout the South.
In contrast to earlier amateur collectors, the Lomaxes were also among the first to attempt to apply scholarly methodology in their work, though they did not adhere to the strict empirical
positivism
Positivism is an empiricist philosophical theory that holds that all genuine knowledge is either true by definition or positive—meaning ''a posteriori'' facts derived by reason and logic from sensory experience.John J. Macionis, Linda M. G ...
adopted by the subsequent generation of academic folklorists, who believed in refraining from drawing conclusions about the data they amassed.
The following year (in July 1934), they visited Angola once again. This time Lead Belly begged them to make a recording of a song he had written to take to the Governor requesting parole, which they did. However, unbeknownst to them, Lead Belly was released in August for good time (and because of cost-cutting due to the Depression) and not because of the Lomaxes' recording, which the Governor may not have listened to. In September 1934, Lead Belly wrote to Lomax requesting employment, since he needed to have a job in order not to be sent back to prison. At the urging of John Jr., Lomax engaged Lead Belly as his driver and assistant, and the pair traveled the South together collecting folk songs for the next three months. Then, in December 1934, Lead Belly famously performed illustrating John Lomax's scheduled lecture of folk songs at a smoker and sing-along held at the national MLA meeting in Philadelphia (see
Lead Belly
Huddie William Ledbetter (; January 20, 1888 – December 6, 1949), better known by the stage name Lead Belly, was an American folk music, folk and blues singer notable for his strong vocals, Virtuoso, virtuosity on the twelve-string guita ...
). Their association continued for three more months until the following March (1935). In January, Lomax, who knew nothing whatever about the recording business, became Lead Belly's manager and, through a friend, cowboy singer
Tex Ritter, got Lead Belly a recording contract with the famous A&R man
Art Satherley
Arthur Edward Satherley (October 19, 1889 – February 10, 1986) was an American record producer and A&R man. Often called Uncle Art Satherley, he made major contributions to the recording industry and has been described as "one of the most impo ...
of
ARC
ARC may refer to:
Business
* Aircraft Radio Corporation, a major avionics manufacturer from the 1920s to the '50s
* Airlines Reporting Corporation, an airline-owned company that provides ticket distribution, reporting, and settlement services
* ...
records. Satherly had publicity photos made of the singer wearing overalls and sitting on sacks of grain, garb and setting that were customary in commercial publicity photos of country singers in those days. But Lead Belly's recordings, marketed as
race music, failed to sell. A filmed re-enactment in early 1935 for ''
The March of Time'' newsreel of Lomax's discovery of Lead Belly in prison, led to the myth that John Lomax made Lead Belly perform in prison stripes (which is inaccurate). He did perform in overalls, however. During Lomax's two-week lecture tour with Lead Belly on the eastern college circuit in March 1935 (pre-scheduled by Lomax before teaming up with Lead Belly), the two men quarreled over money and never spoke to one another again.
John A. Lomax has been accused of paternalism and of tailoring Lead Belly's repertoire and clothing during his brief association with Lead Belly. "But," writes jazz historian Ted Gioia,
few would deny the instrumental role he played in the transformation of the one-time convict into a commercially successful performer of traditional African American music. The turnabout in his life was rapid and profound: Lead Belly was released from prison on August 1, 1934; his schedule for the last week of December that year included performances for the MLA gathering in Philadelphia, for an afternoon tea in Bryn Mawr, and for an informal gathering of professors from Columbia and NYU. Even by the standards of the entertainment industry ... this was a remarkable transformation.
After his three-months as a performer illustrating John A. Lomax's lectures, Lead Belly went on to a 15-year career as an independent artist, championed and assisted intermittently (but not managed) by
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 ...
.
In 1938 John Lomax visited noted writer
Ben Robertson in
Pickens County, South Carolina
Pickens County is located in the northwest part of the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, its population was 131,404. Its county seat is Pickens. The county was created in 1826. It is part of the Greenville-Anderson- Mauldin ...
, where Robertson introduced him to the all-day singing festivals of the area which enabled Lomax to preserve the lyrics of many local folk songs.
The scope of the collection
The Archive of American Folk Song of the Library of Congress contains songs collected in 33 states of the Union and certain parts of the
West Indies
The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...
,
The Bahamas
The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...
, and
Haiti
Haiti (; ht, Ayiti ; French: ), officially the Republic of Haiti (); ) and formerly known as Hayti, is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and ...
. As Curator and Assistant in Charge of the Folk Song Collection John and Alan Lomax supervised and worked with many other folklorists, musicologists, and composers, amateur and professional, all over the country, amassing more than ten thousand records of vocal and instrumental music on aluminum and acetate discs along with many pages of written documentation.
In his 1942 introduction to the multi-volume ''Checklist of Recorded Folk Song in the Library of Congress'',
Harold Spivacke
Harold Spivacke (July 18, 1904 – May 9, 1977) was an American music librarian and administrator. He was Chief of the Music Division of the Library of Congress from 1937 to 1972. In 1940 he co-founded the National Music Council with Julia Ober, F ...
, Chief of the Library of Congress's Division of Music, wrote:
Many hard-working and expert folklorists cooperated in the accumulation of this material, but in the main the development of the Archive of American Folk Song represents the work of two men, John and Alan Lomax. Starting in 1933, the Lomaxes, father and son, traveled tens of thousands of miles, endured many hardships, exercised great patience and tact to win the confidence and friendship of hundreds of singers in order to bring to the Library of Congress records of the voices of countless interesting people they met on the way. Very much remains to be done to make our Archive truly representative of all the people, but the country owes a debt of gratitude to these two men for the excellent foundation laid for future work in this field. ... The Lomaxes received much help in their expeditions from many interested folklorists, some of whom have made important contributions to the Archive as a result of independent expeditions of their own. To these the Library wishes to take this opportunity to express its deep gratitude. They include Gordon Barnes, Mary E. Barnicle, E. C. Beals, Barbara Bell, Paul Brewster
Genevieve Chandler
Richard Chase, Fletcher Collins, Carita D. Corse, Sidney Robertson Cowell
Sidney Robertson Cowell (born Sidney William Hawkins; June 2, 1903 – February 23, 1995) was an American ethnomusicologist, collector of folk songs, and the wife of the composer Henry Cowell.
Life and career
She was born on June 2, 1903, i ...
, Dr. E. K. Davis, Kay Dealy, Seamus Doyle, Charles Draves, Marjorie Edgar, John Henry Faulk
John Henry Faulk (August 21, 1913 – April 9, 1990) was an American storyteller and radio show host. His successful lawsuit against the entertainment industry helped to bring an end to the Hollywood blacklist.
Early life
John Henry Faulk wa ...
, Richard Fento, Helen Hartness Flanders, Frank Goodwin, Percy Grainger
Herbert Halpert
Melville Herskovits
Melville Jean Herskovits (September 10, 1895 – February 25, 1963) was an American anthropologist who helped to first establish African and African Diaspora studies in American academia. He is known for exploring the cultural continuity from A ...
, Zora Neale Hurston
Zora Neale Hurston (January 7, 1891 – January 28, 1960) was an American author, anthropologist, and filmmaker. She portrayed racial struggles in the early-1900s American South and published research on Hoodoo (spirituality), hoodoo. The most ...
, Myra Hull, George Pullen Jackson
George Pullen Jackson (1874–1953) was an American educator and musicologist. He was a pioneer in the field of Southern (U.S.) hymnody. He was responsible for popularizing the term "white spirituals" to describe the "fasola" singing.
Early l ...
, Stetson Kennedy, Bess Lomax
Bess Lomax Hawes (January 21, 1921 – November 27, 2009) was an American folk musician, folklorist, and researcher. She was the daughter of John Avery Lomax and Bess Bauman-Brown Lomax, and the sister of Alan Lomax and John Lomax Jr.
Early l ...
, Elizabeth Lomax, Ruby Terrill Lomax
Ruby Terrill Lomax (1886 – December 28, 1961) was an American educator and folklorist, who worked with her husband John A. Lomax to collect American folk songs, campaigned for women's education, and was Dean of Women at University of Texas at ...
, Eloise Linscott, Bascom Lamar Lunsford
Bascom Lamar Lunsford (March 21, 1882 – September 4, 1973) was a folklorist, performer of traditional Appalachian music, and lawyer from western North Carolina. He was often known by the nickname "Minstrel of the Appalachians."
Biography
...
, Walter McClintock, Alton Morris, Juan B. Rael, Vance Randolph, Helen Roberts, Domingo Santa Cruz, Charles Seeger, Mrs. Nicol Smith, Robert Sonkin, Ruby Pickens Tartt, Jean Thomas, Charles Todd, Margaret Valliant, Ivan Walton, Irene Whitfield, John Woods, an
John W. Work III
This checklist has been prepared as a result of countless requests. ... Its appearance at this time is indeed appropriate since it is natural for a nation at war to try to evaluate and exploit to the fullest its own cultural heritage. In our folk song may be found some of the profoundedst currents that have run through American history. A mere glance at the titles listed here will be sufficient to show the variety and complexity of the democratic life of our country.
After 1942, field work of collecting folk songs under government auspices was discontinued due to a shortage of acetate needed for the war effort. But the work had aroused the ire and suspicion of Southern conservatives in Congress who were fearful it could be used as a cover for civil and worker rights agitation, and because of congressional opposition it has never been resumed.
Legacy
John A. Lomax's contribution to the documentation of American folk traditions extended beyond the Library of Congress Music Division through his involvement with two agencies of the
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...
. In 1936, he was assigned to serve as an advisor on
folklore
Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, ranging ...
collecting for both the
Historical Records Survey and the
Federal Writers' Project
The Federal Writers' Project (FWP) was a federal government project in the United States created to provide jobs for out-of-work writers during the Great Depression. It was part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a New Deal program. It ...
. Lomax's biographer, Nolan Porterfield, notes that the outlines of the famed
WPA
WPA may refer to:
Computing
*Wi-Fi Protected Access, a wireless encryption standard
*Windows Product Activation, in Microsoft software licensing
* Wireless Public Alerting (Alert Ready), emergency alerts over LTE in Canada
* Windows Performance An ...
State Guides resulting from this work resemble Lomax and Benedict's earlier ''Book of Texas''.
As the Federal Writers' Project's first Folklore Editor, Lomax also directed the gathering of ex-
slave
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
narratives and devised a
questionnaire
A questionnaire is a research
Research is "creativity, creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, ...
for project fieldworkers to use.
The WPA project to interview former slaves assumed a form and a scope that bore Lomax's imprint and reflected his experience and zeal as a collector of folklore. His sense of urgency inspired the efforts in several states. And his prestige and personal influence enlisted the support of many project officials, particularly in the deep South, who might otherwise have been unresponsive to requests for materials of this type. One might question the wisdom of selecting Lomax, a white Southerner to direct a project involving the collection of data from black former slaves. Yet whatever racial preconceptions Lomax may have held do not appear to have had an appreciable effect upon the Slave Narrative Collection. Lomax's instructions to interviewers emphasized the necessity of obtaining a faithful account of the ex-slave's version of his or her experience. "It should be remembered that the Federal Writers' Project is not interested in taking sides on any question. The worker should not censor any materials collected regardless of its nature." Lomax constantly reiterated his insistence that the interviews be recorded verbatim, with no holds barred. In his editorial capacity he closely adhered to this dictum.
Upon Lomax's departure this work was continued by
Benjamin A. Botkin, who succeeded Lomax as the Project's folklore editor in 1938, and at the Library in 1939, resulting in the invaluable compendium of authentic slave narratives: ''Lay My Burden Down: A Folk History of Slavery'', edited by B. A. Botkin (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press
The University of Chicago Press is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including ''The Chicago Manual of Style'', ...
, 1945).
John A. Lomax served as president of the Texas Folklore Society for the years 1940–41, and 1941–42. In 1947 his autobiography ''Adventures of a Ballad Hunter'' (New York: Macmillan) was published and was awarded the Carr P. Collins prize as the best book of the year by the Texas Institute of Letters. The book was immediately optioned to be made into a Hollywood movie starring
Bing Crosby
Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. (May 3, 1903 – October 14, 1977) was an American singer, musician and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwide. He was a ...
as Lomax and
Josh White as Lead Belly, but the project was never realized.
In 1932, Lomax met his friend,
Henry Zweifel
Henry may refer to:
People
*Henry (given name)
*Henry (surname)
* Henry Lau, Canadian singer and musician who performs under the mononym Henry
Royalty
* Portuguese royalty
** King-Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal
** Henry, Count of Portugal, ...
, a rancher and businessman then from
Cleburne in
Johnson County, while both were volunteers for
Orville Bullington
Orville may refer to:
People
* Orville (given name), a list of people with the male given name
* Howard Thomas Orville (1901–1960), American naval officer and meteorologist
* Max Orville (born 1962), French politician
* Merlyn Orville Valan (19 ...
's
Republican gubernatorial
A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political_regions, political region, ranking under the Head of State, head of state and in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of ...
race against the
Democrat
Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to:
Politics
*A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people.
*A member of a Democratic Party:
**Democratic Party (United States) (D)
**Democratic ...
Miriam Ferguson. Lomax's old enemy, James Ferguson, was virtually running his wife's comeback attempt at the governorship.
Lomax died of a
stroke
A stroke is a medical condition in which poor blood flow to the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and hemorrhagic, due to bleeding. Both cause parts of the brain to stop functionin ...
at the age of eighty in January 1948. On June 15 of that year, Lead Belly gave a concert at the University of Texas, performing children's songs such as "
Skip to My Lou
"Skip to My (The) Lou" is a popular American partner-stealing dance from the 1840s.
Poet and Abraham Lincoln biographer Carl Sandburg writes that "Skip-to-my-Lou" was a popular party game in US President Abraham Lincoln's youth in southern In ...
" and spirituals (performed with his wife Martha) that he had first sung years before for the late collector.
[Charles Wolfe and Kip Lornell, ''The Life and Legend of Leadbelly'' (New York: Da Capo Press, 1999 ]992
Year 992 ( CMXCII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
Events
By place
Worldwide
* Winter – A superflare from the sun causes an Aurora Borealis, with visibility as fa ...
, p. 254.
In 2010, John A. Lomax was inducted into the
Western Music Hall of Fame
The Western Music Association Hall of Fame is sponsored by the Western Music Association. Inductees are those individuals deemed important to the traditional and contemporary music of the American West and the American Cowboy. The organization is ...
for his contributions to the field of cowboy music.
Following in his grandfather's footsteps, Lomax's grandson
John Lomax III John Lomax III (born August 20, 1944) is an American journalist, music distributor and manager who has worked with many country music and folk music musicians, such as Townes Van Zandt, Steve Earle, David Schnaufer, The Cactus Brothers, Kasey Chamb ...
is a nationally published
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
music journalist, author of ''Nashville: Music City USA'' (1986), ''Red Desert Sky'' (2001) and co-author of ''The Country Music Book'' (1988). He is also an artist manager and has represented
Townes Van Zandt,
Steve Earle
Stephen Fain Earle (; born January 17, 1955) is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, author, and actor. Earle began his career as a songwriter in Nashville and released his first EP in 1982. Initially working in the country music g ...
, Rocky Hill,
David Schnaufer David Schnaufer (September 28, 1952 – August 23, 2006) was an American folk musician. He is widely credited with restoring the popularity of the Appalachian dulcimer.
Schnaufer was born in Hearne, Texas, and grew up in La Marque, Texas. Schnaufer ...
and The Cactus Brothers. He began representing the Dead Ringer Band in 1996. John Lomax III was also a music writer for Houston's early-'70s underground newspaper,
Space City!
Notes
References
* Lomax, John A. ''Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads''. New York: Collier Books, reissued 1938 (1910).
* Lomax, John A. "Unexplored Treasures of Texas Folk-Lore". Reprinted in Stith Thompson's ''Round the Levee''. Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press,
935
Year 935 ( CMXXXV) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
Events
By place
Europe
* Spring – Arnulf I ("the Bad") of Bavaria invades Italy, crossing through the Upper ...
facsimile edition 1975.
* Porterfield, Nolan. ''Last Cavalier: The Life and Times of John A. Lomax, 1867–1948'', University of Illinois Press, 2001.
* Spivacke, Harold. ''Library Of Congress Music Division: Checklist of Recorded Songs in the English Language in the Archive of American Folk Song to July, 1940 (3 Volume Set) Library of Congress'' (Paperback, March 1, 1942) ASIN: B0017HYX4E
* Wade, Stephen. ''A Treasury of Library of Congress Field Recordings''. Rounder Audio CD, 1997. ASIN: B0000002UB. Contains recordings of
E. C. Ball,
Honeyboy Edwards Honey Boy may refer to:
People
* Honeyboy Edwards (1915–2011), American Delta blues guitarist and singer from Mississippi
*George "Honey Boy" Evans
George Evans (10 March 1870 – 5 March 1915) known as "Honey Boy" Evans was a Welsh-born songw ...
,
Texas Gladden,
Vera Hall
Adell Hall Ward, better known as Vera Hall (April 6, 1902 – January 29, 1964) was an American folk singer, born in Livingston, Alabama. Best known for her 1937 song "Trouble So Hard", she was inducted into the Alabama Women's Hall of Fame ...
,
Justice Learned Hand, Kelly Pace
W. H. Stepp Sonny Terry
Saunders Terrell (October 24, 1911 – March 11, 1986), known as Sonny Terry, was an American Piedmont blues and folk musician, who was known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers and oc ...
, and many more.
* Wilgus, D. K. ''Anglo-American Folksong Scholarship since 1898''. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1959.
* Wolfe, Charles, and Kip Lornell. ''Life and Legend of Leadbelly''. New York: Da Capo,
992
Year 992 ( CMXCII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
Events
By place
Worldwide
* Winter – A superflare from the sun causes an Aurora Borealis, with visibility as fa ...
1999.
* Zumwalt, Rosemary Levy. ''American Folklore Scholarship: a Dialogue of Dissent'' (Indiana University Press, 1988).
External links
*
*
*
"Lomax, John Avery" in the Handbook of Texas OnlineThe Defenders, 1913–1926: The Association Saves the University from an Educational Infanticide", ''The Alcalde'' (January 2010).*
ttp://rs6.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/lomax:@field(DOCID+@lit(fn0017)) 1939 Southern Recording Trip Fieldnotes at the Library of Congress
Notes on the John and Ruby Lomax 1930 Southern States Recording Trip at the Library of Congress
Lead Belly and the LomaxesBooks by John A. and Alan Lomax* [http://www.austin360.com/music/discovering-keepers-of-folk-music-623055.html?viewAsSinglePage=true# Discovering Keepers of Folk Music. Article by Michael Corcoran in ''Austin Statesman'' about John A. Lomax and the Gant family of Austin, Texas]
* Retrieved 24 November 2014.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lomax, John
1867 births
1948 deaths
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People from Goodman, Mississippi
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John
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