A great book that tells the story of a song collectors adventures and includes the songs she collected is "A Song Catcher in Southern Mountains, American Folk songs of British Ancestry" by Dorothy Scarborough (1937, Columbia University Press). Ms Scarborough was an Associate Professor of English at Columbia University in New York and she spent time collecting songs in the hills and moutains of Virginia and North Carolina.

Another excellent book on this topic is "Here's To The Women: 100 songs For And About American Women" by Hilda Wenner and Elizabeth Freilicher (1987, Syracuse University Press). There is backgound information for all the songs that includes historical setting, or biographical information about the subject of the song, or biographical information about the songwriter.

In the realm of the very obscure recording I offer "A Sampler of Michigan Women" 9 songs written and performed by Candace Anderson (1985 Hermonikher). The women honored run from the famous, Sojourner Truth, the not quite as famous, Josephine Carey a labor organizer, to the virtual unknown, Jenny Justine Jokala a cook in a looging camp in the UP.

rich r