Today, this classic folk song is usually sung as a popular pro-American anthem, but it was written to have a radical edge that urged the country to make its bounty available to rich and poor alike. It was 1939 and folk singer Woody Guthrie was sick of hearing the song “God Bless America” on the radio. He felt it was too sappy, too blindly patriotic, and too cut off from the hard-knock life many American’s were facing as the Great Depression dragged into its 10th year. Guthrie knew firsthand how tough life could be for poor folks. Since his teens, he had hopped trains and hitchhiked back and forth across the country. He shared the road with former farmers, laid-off factory workers, and migrants chasing hopes of work. Along the way, he chronicled their adventures, dreams, and sorrows in song. In February 1940, Guthrie decided to fight music with music, and in reaction to “God Bless America,” he worked up a single song that tried to capture his love of the American landscape. At the same time, he wanted to point out that a lot of Americans weren’t feeling blessed at all. That’s the story behind “This Land Is Your Land.”
