Re: John Henry

["Charles Brown" <CharlesB@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

         Excerpt from a letter from John Henry to his children


It wasn't that I thought I could beat that machine.
It was a protest, a joke.
And I didn't die. Heckeeeenaw !
I just passed out.
The boys and me had a good laugh.

You see, they wanted to breakup our crew,
Since they had the machine.

But beside our strength and our skill,
We only *had* each other,
Cause they sure didn't pay us decent.
Our families couldn't live right.
We had some pride and joy in our jobs.

Hell, I had nothing against a machine.
It could make things easier.
But the bosses didn't see it that way.

You know, they always try to make you think
It's hopeless to fight them.
And that they're always way ahead of ya,
And that things will always be this way,
And there's nothin' you can do about it.
It gets you down.

That's the way they talked about slavery too,
But they was wrong about that.

When it comes down to it,
Life's work and freedom.
That's worth fighting for.
Otherwise, what's the difference,
Between a man and a machine ?

>>> Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx> 10/07/99 03:21PM >>>
At 03:16 PM 10/7/99 -0400, you wrote:
>Keynes'   *in the long run we are all dead* notwithstanding, in the long
term there will be a business downturn even in the U.S. Then the
hoodwinking of the people about the amazing length of the boom , the
unprecedented, uninterrupted growth of the GDP will come home to roost. It
will be the stupid economy , instead of the economy, stupid. The class
struggle will heat up and the revolution will be thorough, more thorough
this time than the last, if we can unite the working class for struggle and
winning based on the concrete analysis of concrete events in the short term.
>
>John Henry

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, June 18, 1996

LEGACY OF JOHN HENRY, THE HAMMER MAN

BYLINE: Robert Tabscott

John Henry was just a little baby
Sittin' on his mammy's knee,
Said the Big Bend Tunnel on the C&O Road
Is gonna be the death of me, O, Lawd
Gonna be the death of me.

-snip_


Before I let your steam drill beat me down
Gonna die with my hammer in my hand,
Lawd, Lawd,
Die with my hammer in my hand."