Back before the workers of America received any sort of breaks, benefits, or even fair pay, the greed infested factories were slowly wearing down and killing the spirit of this great land. An immigrant from sweden named Joel Emmanuel Haggland, came to America after both his parents died on the workforce. Later to be known as the legendary Joe Hill, he begun to conceptualize what we know today as the workers union (then called the Wobblies or I.W.W.), an organization that banned together in protest of the exploiting employers that were responsible for the oppression of their generation. The song "Joe Hill" performed here by Paul Robeson, is just one of the many story-songs that have carried on the legacy of this immortal hero of the american workforce.
Music in this time was used to strengthen spirits, as Joe Glazer says here "An extra weapon of the heart, not just the head". Songs like "Solidarity Forever", helped people ban together with a simple motto to move the movement in the right direction. Joe Glazer revolutionized these songs by starting Collector's Records and mass producing the sound of the labor union, earning him the nickname of the labor movement's troubadour. The music helped people through the struggle of long protest, making people want to "Do or die for the cause, and go out singin'".
Songs about Joe hill continue to inspire the workers of america to fight for fair pay even today. In the 1980's, Billy Bragg sung in support of a miner's protest in Britain in 1985, as well as the songs of Joe Hill and Woody Guthrie, influencing this powerful american style of song and protest to a different part of the world.
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