I knew of Pete Seeger through my father’s record collection and was extremely honored to meet the social activist, banjo player, folk singer, and environmentalist in person. This photo was taken after I performed at the at the annual Beacon Sloop Club Pumpkin Festival. He was kind enough to take a photo with me, actually a friend who was there suggested the photo, so a big thanks to him!!
If you don’t know who Pete Seeger was and you are wondering why is this old man is significant, if you watch A Complete Unknown, Edward Norton portrays him in the movie. He was a folk singer and his songs brought awareness to injustices, labor unions and equality for all.
Rainbow Quest was a tv show hosted by Pete Seeger in the 1960’s. His guest included Johnny Cash, Buffy Ste. Marie ( who was the first woman to breastfeed on television – the show was Sesame Street-1976) Libba Cotten the upside down guitar player,(her guitar was upside down, she didn’t perform upside down). Cotten’s song Freight Train was covered by Jerry Garcia and David Grisman in the album Not For Kids Only. ( Fun Fact – the album was released in the 1990’s and I got it as a Christmas present from my Mom).
You may have seen Pete Seeger perform with Bruce Springsteen at the Barack Obama pre-inaugural concert.
Photo courtesy of USA Today
(this link also shares President Obama’s thoughts on Pete Seeger)
In this photo they were singing Woody Guthrie’s song This Land Is Your Land.
Pete Seeger had met Woody Guthrie, the author of This Land Is Your Land in his 20’s. They traveled together jumping trains and were part of the Almanac Singers. They traveled across America singing protest and pro-union songs. They sang to enliven, encourage and to support the poor, the oppressed, and the exploited. They were both drafted into the army in the 1940’s.
Pete Seeger and the FBI
I’m diving into this a bit because I found it fascinating that the FBI files on Pete had over 1800 pages! I started to do research and discovered so much more about the man, the musician, the mover and shaker.
In the 1940’s Private Pete Seeger wrote a letter to the California American Legion in 1942. They forwarded the letter to Military Intelligence and the FBI got involved.
Dear Sirs –
I felt shocked, outraged, and disgusted to read that the California American Legion voted to 1) deport all Japanese after the war, citizen or not, 2) Bar all Japanese descendants from citizenship!!
We, who may have to give our lives in this great struggle—we’re fighting precisely to free the world of such Hitlerism, such narrow jingoism.
If you deport Japanese, why not Germans, Italians, Rumanians, Hungarians, and Bulgarians?
If you bar from citizenship descendants of Japanese, why not descendants of English? After all, we once fought with them too.
America is great and strong as she is because we have so far been a haven to all oppressed.
I felt sick at heart to read of this matter.
Yours truly,
Pvt. Peter Seeger
I am writing also to the Los Angeles Times.
(Under President Franklin Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066 over 100,00 west coast American citizens were forced to leave their homes and live in internment camps. )
The California American Legion forwarded Pete’s letter to the FBI in San Francisco and that got the attention of the Military Intelligence Service within the War Department. Agents went and interviewed people from his high school, Harvard College and lots of other people. In this report they are interviewing Pete’s father.
The files led me down a curious little rabbit hole.
They never scared him enough to stop him from singing and speaking his thoughts. Even though in August 1955 he was brought before the House Un-American Activities Commitee, in August 18, 1955. He was a American that believed in the principles of free speech, right to privacy.
Click here to read transcript.
At the 1955 hearing , Mr. Seeger refused to answer questions he was sentenced to a year in prison for contempt, but the verdict reversed in 1962. Maybe it was because of the letter he wrote to President John F Kennedy?
National Archives Identifier: 7741350Full Citation: Letter from Pete Seeger to President John F. Kennedy; 3/3/1961; Seeger: L-Z; Name File, 1/20/1961 – 11/22/1963; Collection JFK-6.2: Papers of John F. Kennedy: Presidential Papers: White House Central Name File; John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, MA. [Online Version, https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/letter-pete-seeger-to-jfk, December 20, 2024]
I leave you with these thoughts….
What a commotion one voice can make.
Speak up
Be Heard.
I met Pete Seeger back in the seventies. He was so nice to come to a demonstration I organized outside the United Nations in New York against the junta in Greece. He is a fantastic human being and a great artist. The FBI had a lot of work those days. The Justice Department declared me as a rep of a foreign power, namely Andreas Papandreou, who fought the junta and after its fall the prime minister of Greece.
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