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Not truly a folk hero
- Although there were songs about John Henry, there were few stories of him, and, like Paul Bunyan, he is not truly a folk hero. The imaginative treatment by Roark Bradford in John Henry (1931) made the name known to many Americans.
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The story of John Henry is told in a classic blues folk song about his duel against a drilling machine, which exists in many versions, and has been the subject of numerous stories, plays, books, and novels.
- 1840s or 1850s
- American folk hero
Mar 7, 2024 · John Henry, hero of a widely sung African American folk ballad. It describes his contest with a steam drill, in which John Henry crushed more rock than the machine did but died ‘with his hammer in his hand.’
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Aug 1, 2013 · John Henry: Hero of American Folklore. By Abby August 1, 2013 Category: Articles, Folk Music. One of the most colorful characters in American folklore is the legendary John Henry. Whether he was a true historical figure or a fictitious hero carved into the minds of common Americans by oral tradition, his story has given inspiration to generations.
Folklorists have long thought John Henry to be mythical, but historian Scott Nelson has discovered that he was a real person—a nineteen-year-old from New Jersey who was convicted of theft in a Virginia court in 1866, sentenced to ten years in the penitentiary, and put to work building the C&O Railroad.
Railroad folklore West Virginia folklore. Now John Henry was a mighty man, yes sir. He was born a slave in the 1840's but was freed after the war. He went to work as a steel-driver for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, don't ya know. And John Henry was the strongest, the most powerful man working the rails.
Ken Thomas. Along with Paul Bunyan and Johnny Appleseed, John Henry is one of the most famous American folk heroes. The story of John Henry is usually told through a folk song called a ballad. The ballad describes a contest between John Henry, a strong African American man who works on the railroad, and a new machine.
May 9, 2018 · Folklore and Mythology. John Henry. views 1,307,099 updated May 09 2018. John Henry. A towering, legendary American working-class folk heroes, John Henry represents not only the nineteenth-century struggle of the human spirit against the coming industrial era but also African-American resistance to white labor domination.