A Gift And A History Lesson Rolled Into One

I was having a little trouble coming up with something to commemorate Hubby Tony's passage of 60 of the last 100 days until his retirement, so I started surfing the web. There I came across a song by Pete Seeger called "Sixty Percent". The song was on his album called American Industrial Ballads, which was released in 1956 by Folkways Records and reissued in 1992 by Smithsonian Folkways.

 

I'm sixty percent an American 

I'm sixty percent a man 

That's what parity say I am 

That's the law of the land 

 

Now do I work sixty percent of each day? 

Eat sixty percent of my meals? 

And does my truck take me into town 

On sixty percent of its wheels? 

 

Now will my chicks be content to eat 

Just sixty percent of their mash? 

And will the middleman give my throat 

Just sixty percent of a slash? 

 

Now all you workers in city and town 

I know your budget's a mess 

But when you get to that last lousy buck 

Remember I've forty cents less!

 

I guessed there was some history behind the lyrics, and came across the liner notes to the album. There I learned that the song was composed by a man named Les Rice, who was a New York apple farmer and a former president of his county's Farmers Union. The song was written in 1948 or 1949, and talks about how the problem of parity (the issue of farm income keeping up with farm costs) affects a farmer's life. 

 

Five years ago today: Where Are They Coming From?