On this day in Labor History the year was 1983.
That was the day that musician Merle Travis died.
Known for his unique finger-picking guitar style, Travis wrote songs that captured the hard life of the coal miner.
His songs drew from what he had seen growing up in Muhlenberg County, Kentucky.
He was born in Rosewood, the son of a coal miner.
In 1947 Merle released a four-record set Folk Songs from the Hills.
The album contained the song “Dark as a Dungeon” what would become one of his most recognized songs, “Oh come all you young fellers so young and so fine, Seek not your fortune in a dark dreary mine, It'll form as a habit and seep in your soul, Till the stream of your blood runs as black as the coal, Where it's dark as a dungeon damp as the dew danger is double pleasures are few, Where the rain never falls the sun never shines, It's a dark as a dungeon way down in the mine.
Another song about the life of a miner was “Nine Pound Hammer, “It’s a long way to Harlan, it’s a long way to Hazard, Just to get a little brew, just to get a little brew, Well, when I’m long gone you can make my tombstone, Outta number nine coal, outta number nine coal.”
Perhaps Travis’s most famous song was “Sixteen Tons,” You load sixteen tons, what do you get, Another day older and deeper in debt, Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go, I owe my soul to the company store.” In 1977 Merle Travis was elected into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Labor History in 2:00 brought to you by the Illinois Labor History Society and The Rick Smith Show