Pete Seeger was far more than just someone who sang songs.
During his 94 years of life, his words, thoughts, actions, and convictions combined with his musical talent to shape the country we know today. Here are just 5 ways Pete Seeger helped change America.
He helped preserve early American folk music
In late 1939/early 1940, a young Seeger worked briefly at the Archive Of American Folk Song at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C., under the ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax. While there, he helped catalogue and transcribe field recordings taken from all over the US, helping preserve music that would not have otherwise been heard.
He inspirted the 1960s folk revival
Seeger’s links with leftist groups caused him to come under investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) during 1955. Even though he was subsequently blacklisted as a performer, he continued to sing on the underground circuit and frequently appeared at college campuses. His efforts, and the gradual change of political landscape, helped spawn the early 1960s folk movement. It was then that the songs that Seeger had written/co-written during his wilderness years such as “If I Had A Hammer” and “Where Have All The Flowers Gone?” became popular.
He helped “We Shall Overcome” become a Civil Rights anthem
After first hearing it in 1947, Seeger is frequently credited with changing the title and the chorus of the spiritual “We Will Overcome” to “We Shall Overcome.” He also added extra verses and performed it frequently at the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee. On one occasion in 1957, a young Dr Martin Luther King Jr., was in the audience and upon hearing “We Shall Overcome” for the first time, King was reported to have said that the song had stayed in his head. During the early 1960s, “We Shall Overcome” became a central slogan of the Civil Rights movement.
He was an early patron of Bob Dylan
Although the story of an angry Seeger threatening to cut the electric cables during Dylan’s electric performance at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 is often told, Seeger did much to support Dylan in the early 1960s. One of the reasons that Dylan signed to Columbia in 1961 was because Seeger (a huge influence on the young singer) was also on the label. Seeger also helped bring Dylan to the Newport Folk Festival in 1963, which turned out to be a breakout performance.
He helped clean up the Hudson River
For most of his life, Seeger lived in Beacon, NY. In 1966, the pollution in the nearby Hudson River inspired him and other local residents to build a giant boat which would go up and down the river and draw attention to the problem. In 1969, he also started the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater foundation which still exists today and is dedicated to protecting the river through advocacy and education.
