“(Her songs) are deadlier and stronger than rifle bullets and have cut a wider swath than a machine gun could”

Woody Guthrie about Sarah Ogan Gunning


"Dedication. This recording is respectfully dedicated to the millions of hard-working people who really made America great, in the sure knowledge that one day they will gather up their strength, their courage and their wisdom, and they will come together to smash this decayed and dying system. They will use their inventiveness and industry to raise all our people to a decent living standard, and restore us to a place of respect among the fellowship of nations. They are the creators of history, and they will construct the socialist future.

Specifically, I want to dedicate these songs to my sister , Julia, who has recently entered that great school of Life, the industrial working class. She has already learned that she is much more than the timid, ignorant housewife she thought she was, and more than the underpaid, isolated book-keeper and salesclerk she had to be. Now she knows she can operate powerful and dangerous machines, she can think through her problems and speak up against anyone who threatens her right to work and live. Every day new wisdom, new strength and beauty grow in her because she is no longer alone. She is part of the millions."

Sarah Ogan Gunning

"When Sara Ogan wrote this song, she had just experienced the loss of her mother and her baby, and her husband was dying of tuberculosis. It was in the 1930s, in the part of Kentucky where the historic battles to organize the mine workers was raging, in the depths of the nation‘s worst depression. Her half-sister, Aunt Molly Jackson, her brother Jim Garland, and Sara herself wrote the strongest and clearest and most angry songs to come out of these times."

Barbara Dane

"She's a housewife and more than a housewife. A mother and more than a mother. She’s worked and slaved and fought to save the children of her own home, and to keep her own house, and she was so full of the Union Spirit that she found time to get out in the wind and rain and the hail of bullets from the deputies guns, and make up her own songs and sing them to give nerve and backbone to the starving men that slaved in the coal mines

(Her songs) are deadlier and stronger than rifle bullets and have cut a wider swath than a machine gun could

Sara loved her husband. He's dead from hard work in the mines. She loved her baby that died. She loves the two she’s still got, and she hates the system that wrecked her family. Hates the set-up that robbed her kids' mouths. Hates the guns of war that aim at her songs and daughters. Hates all of these big Crooks and Greedy Rich Folks, reason is because she Loves what She Loves, and she'll fight to protect her Home.

(The big rich guys) claim they own all of this stuff. Sara says they don’t. Sara says it belongs equal and alike to all of us. I say Sara is right. It damn shore don’t belong to no one special feller, nor no one special family, nor no few special families. It belongs equal and alike to all of us. Me, and you. Us.

I sing this song every time I can because I agree with her, with all my heart.

Woody Guthrie

I hate the capitalist system

I hate the capitalist system,
And I'll tell you the reason why:
It has caused me so much suffering,
And my dearest friends to die.

Well I know you all are wondering
What it has done to me.
Well I am going to tell you
That my husband has TB

Brought on by hard work and low wages,
And never enough to eat,
From going cold and hungry,
With no shoes upon his feet.

My husband was a coal miner
Who worked hard and risked his life,
Just trying to support three children,
Himself, his mother and wife.

Well I had a blue-eyed baby
Was the darling of my heart.
But from my little darling
Her mother had to part.

While the rich and mighty capitalist
Goes dressed in jewels and silk,
My darling blue-eyed baby
Has died for the want of milk.

Wellthey call this the land of plenty,
And for them I guess it's true,
For the rich and mighty capitalist,
Not for workers like me and you.

Well what can we do about it
To these men of power and might?
Well I tell you, Mr. Capitalist,
We are going to fight, fight, fight.

Sarah Ogan Gunning

Enn Kokk: I Hate The Capitalist System

Dreadful Memories: The Life of Sarah Ogan Gunning, 1910-1983