Mining the excellent Mudcat brain for insight regarding origin and/or predecessors to Guthrie's Ranger's Command. I'm aware of several recordings: Joan Baez, Cisco Houston, the Hillmen, and others. It doesn't seem related to old songs about the Texas Rangers I'm aware of, and the "fair maiden" in Woody's song appeard to be a rip-snorter - unusual in this type of western song. She "drinks that hard liquor from a cold bitter cup: and rouses the cowboys out of bed to "fight for their land." Kind of a modernist take, yet Woody and most others have sung it in an older, pre-commercial form. Any thoughts?