I actually met Mac McClintock when I was a young man. I think the town he lived in was
El Segundo near Long Beach California. I believe that's where the Queen Mary is docked. I spent the afternoon with Mac. He told me that he was a railroad "boomer" meaning that he could hop any freight in the country and as a railroad worker not be hassled by the "bulls". He was a delightful person and I remember that we went after our visit to hear a Mexican Tipeca Band play at the local park.

My favorite line (having to do with jerk, Turk and work" was the one he sang,
"They boiled in oil the inventor of toil".

Mac was very popular in Chicago with his own radio show before I met him. He was fairly
along in years when I met him. He must have known Joe Hill and another interesting songwriter/publisher Bob Miller who wrote "Rich Man Poor Man" and had a hit with a country song called "There's a Star Spangled Banner Waving Somewhere".

I think Mac was like A.P. Carter who took old songs and rewrote them. After all, this is the "folk process" and.this is how a lot of variants get transmitted from their source. I think a folk song is like a rock in a stream which gets polished as the water runs over it. A song gets sung by so many that it has a unique quality to it. They call this "The communal theory of folk music".

"Preacher and the Slave" by Joe Hill is "In the Sweet Bye and Bye", an old hymn in the way that "Which Side Are You On" is an old hymn rewritten by Florence Reese based on "Lay the Lily Low". None of Woody Guthrie or Bob Dylan's melodies are completely original. You can trace their sources. But this is the "folk process". In a way, it's a definition of what a folk song is.