"They each wanted a beautiful shining pair that sang, 'Creaky-squeaky-creaky-squeaky,' every time they walked." However, Mammy and Pappy give them reasons they cannot have them, such as, "You can't find shoes like that in these hills!" and "We've everything we need right here in these hills." So they go to Granny who gives them an idea to plant turnip seeds and when they grow into "fine big turnips" they can take them down down the mountain to town to sell for a pair of shoes. So that is just what Hetty and Hank do.

    Discover the diversity, spontaneity, free-flowing melody, and sheer invention of scores of songs sung by cowboys and convicts, lumberjacks, hobos, miners, plantation slaves, mountaineers, soldiers, and many others.One of the remarkable features of this collection is its authenticity. Many of the songs were recorded "on location" by noted folklorist John A. Lomax and his even more famous son, Alan, as they traveled around the United States. The results are firsthand versions of music and lyrics for over 200 railroad songs, chain-gang songs, mountain songs, Creole songs, cocaine and whisky songs, "reels," minstrel songs, songs of childhood, and a host of others. Among them are such time-honored favorites as "John Henry," "Goin' Home," "Frankie and Albert," "Down in the Valley," "Little Brown Jug," "Alabama-Bound," "Shortenin' Bread," "Skip to My Lou," "Frog Went a-Courtin'," and a host of others. An excellent introduction, notes on each song, a bibliography, and an index round out this extensive and valuable collection.Musician, musicologists, folklorists, singers — anyone interested in American folk music — will welcome this treasury of timeless song gathered in one handy, inexpensive volume.

    Ford. First published in 1934 and mostly neglected in Cunard's own time, Negro has attained the status of a cult classic. The list of contributors--represented in poetry, prose, translations, and music--is a who's who of 20th-century arts and literature: Louis Armstrong, Samuel Beckett, Norman Douglas, Nancy Cunard herself, Theodore Dreiser, W. E. B. DuBois, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, William Plomer, Arthus Schomburg, William Carlos Williams, and more.In its subject and international approach, Negro was generations ahead of its time. Its exploration of black achievement and black anger takes the reader from life in America to the West Indies, South America, Europe, and Africa. Though very much of its time, Negro is also timeless in its depiction of oppressive social and political conditions as well as in its homage to myriad contributions by black artists and thinkers.