The folk singer John McCutcheon recently performed at the National World War I Museum and Memorial.  You may be familiar with his song, “Christmas in the Trenches,” which is about the Christmas Truce in 1914.  If you aren’t familiar with it:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJi41RWaTCs

McCutcheon mentioned during the concert the songs of Joe Hill, who was an organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World–the Wobblies, as they’re often called–a subject that might deserve a post for their own activities during the WWI era.  Hill wrote songs, using existing tunes, to promote the IWW’s positions, and as you might guess from the title of this post, one of the songs he used was a very familiar WWI song, which he wrote in 1915.  Here’s “It’s a Long Way to the Soup Line:”  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wse1yH8qVWs

To refresh your memory, here’s Jim Patton’s post from September:  http://www.kansasww1.org/tipperary-lives-on/

 

 

Blair Tarr is the Museum Curator of the Kansas State Historical Society. He oversees the three-dimensional collections of the Society, but has special interests in the Civil War, Wichita-made Valentine diners, and Leavenworth's Abernathy Furniture. In the last few years he has also done a lot of cramming on The Great War. He is a past president of the Kansas Museums Association and the Civil War Round Tables of both Kansas City and Eastern Kansas. He is currently a board member of the Heritage League of Greater Kansas City.