Musicmic, there are some incorrect statements.

You don't know what my allegiances are.


Actually I was not just in Chicago. I have lived in various parts of the United States. My perspective is broader than you give me credit for. I worked all over the country as a folk singer. I have traveled throughout the South and lived in California quite a lot.

Not all the folk musicians who you designate were "rock-ribbed reactionaries". Many had various points of view. Many of the African-American musicians we encountered were certainly not part of the white Southern reactionary point of view. This is a sweeping and misassumed generalization. There were and are fundamentalists everywhere.

On the same subject, there is a common assumption that everyone in the South supported the Confederacy. Ostensibly it would seem so until you talk to lots of Southerners. There is no real consensus on this. Many of the defenders of the "battle flag" were "carpetbaggers".


Many of us on the left were able to talk about the political leanings of Lunsford and others quite succinctly. There might have been those who were in a state of denial about this, but those who really knew the folk music such as Pete knew better. It was all too obvious that the folk music was not unilaterally accepted by the public in the North or the South. It was a hope by many on the Left that the appreciation for the working class would be given through the revelation of folk music. It was not a given.

As to the arrogance that you intimate, Pete has never shown signs of this in his career. Naivete perhaps. But it has to be stated that the Left is not the boogy-man that has been painted historically. Arrogance is a judgement call and it doesn't fit all of those who were in the Left. As a matter of fact, an over-reaction has occurred by those who found out about Stalin and the CP in the Soviet Union. Like every over-reaction, it fails to take in the good things that were done by the CPUSA regardless if you agreed with their political agenda or not. A more balanced approach would be to accept that which was useful and that which was not.

Frank Hamilton





I never knew Ken Goldstein to be cynical. I thought and still think he was a great folklorist. Archie Green has decried his association with the Left but it needs to be said that they benefitted from the support that they received from the Left. As to Kenny's personal religious beliefs, I don't think they were ever compromised by the Labor movement.