May is the month for the folk singer, labor organizer, storyteller, activist and poet Utah Phillips. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, on May 15, 1935, he died in Nevada City, CA, on May 23, 2008.
From the archives of TUC Radio - this is a celebration of his life and an account, in his own words, of how he became an activist.
"The golden voice of the great American Southwest", Bruce "U. Utah" Phillips came to the Unitarian Fellowship Hall in Berkeley on May 18, 2004, to talk about his life.â¨â¨Phillips parents were union organizers in the 1930s. When he left home to join a road crew in Yellowstone Park the older workers, who played guitars, taught Phillips how to turn his ukulele chords into guitar chords.â¨â¨As a soldier during the war on Korea, Phillips continued to find refuge in music and helped to form a band. After he returned to the United States he befriended Ammon Hennessey at the Joe Hill House for Transients and Migrants. Hennessey convinced him to become a pacifist and to use music as a political weapon.
Come back for the second part of this one hour talk when Utah Phillips remembered the founding of the Poor Peopleâs Party for children, working with the Mormon Church, the Black Panthers and Judi Bari, and how he became involved with the Folk Singers movement.
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