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(8,830 posts)Have to admit I prefer the Tennessee Ernie Ford version - probably because that's what I grew up hearing.
Thanks for posting; it's easy to forget these fantastic, meaning filled ballads.
doc03
(35,151 posts)Tennessee Ernie Ford's original? Bob Murray of the Utah mine disaster a few years ago just purchased all the union mines in this area. Stay tuned for union busting and more mining deaths in Eastern Ohio, WV and PA coal fields. He is the scum bag that has posted "Save America Fire Obama" and "War on Coal" signs all over the eastern USA coal fields. Now if there was a "War on Coal" why in the f---k would you spend several billion dollars to buy more coal mines?
Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Miserable fucker.
Brigid
(17,621 posts)I picked this one because I think Cash's voice suits the song even better, and I love the video.
As for Bob Murray all I can say is
RebelOne
(30,947 posts)Curmudgeoness
(18,219 posts)I was uninspired by the Cash version. Tennessee Ernie Ford gives me chills.
RebelOne
(30,947 posts)Last edited Fri Dec 6, 2013, 10:12 PM - Edit history (1)
Curmudgeoness
(18,219 posts)When I found the "go-go version" of this, I had to quit.
RebelOne
(30,947 posts)Boudica the Lyoness
(2,899 posts)My fav too.
bmbmd
(3,088 posts)Poignant, powerful, and meaningful.
Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Demo_Chris
(6,234 posts)Brigid
(17,621 posts)I love the way they used footage from "Joe Versus the Volcano."
bmbmd
(3,088 posts)Must be a brain fog.
Tanuki
(14,894 posts)MoonRiver
(36,926 posts)My parents built, from scratch with little money, a thriving business. They were independent and very happy that way. So, when I heard "16 Tons" it deeply affected me. I had no experience with that reality and was really scared about the concept a company owning somebody's soul.
Brigid
(17,621 posts)I can't find it separately, but it involves a group of new miner -- blacks who didn't know they were brought in to work as scabs -- are being told that their train ride from AL, use of the wash house, equipment, etc., would all be deducted from their pay, which would be issued in "scrip," usable at the company store. If the workers bought items available at the company store from elsewhere, they would be fired without pay.
The coal mines were not the only employers that behaved this way. In a documentary I have about late nineteenth-century Chicago, one woman talked about her mother, who came with her family to Chicago in the 1880s. At 13, her mother took a job in a garment factory.The workers were charged rent for the machines they operated, needles that broke, and oil for the machines. Appalling.
MoonRiver
(36,926 posts)The bastards who make money on the backs of humans or animals have no souls.
Brigid
(17,621 posts)It's an incredible movie.
Thanks Brigid!
madrchsod
(58,162 posts)MoonRiver
(36,926 posts)He looks very old in that video, but is still great.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Capt.Rocky300
(1,005 posts)X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Skittles
(152,967 posts)yes indeed
spanone
(135,637 posts)Drahthaardogs
(6,843 posts)William769
(55,124 posts)Cannot even fully comprehend the true meaning of that song unless they actually experienced it first hand.
Sometimes ankle to knee deep in cold water, hunched over, shovel in hand, with a belt flapping by your waist that will tear off your arm if you're not careful and trip the wrong way.
Dark when you get up, dark where you work, dark when you leave.
Never again, for me.
Trailrider1951
(3,409 posts)William769
(55,124 posts)rocktivity
(44,555 posts)rocktivity
seveneyes
(4,631 posts)Mopar151
(9,965 posts)Definitive version performed by Jim & Jesse "And they dug it all up, til the land was forsaken, and put it all down to the progress of man."
baldguy
(36,649 posts)90-percent
(6,828 posts)"Johnny was going to come to the concert tonight and he was going to sing with us....." - Frank Zappa
R.O.F. starts at about 4:40.
-90% Jimmy
Initech
(99,915 posts)Isoldeblue
(1,135 posts)I got a 45 record player. The very first 45 I got to play on it was this song, by TEF... I played it a zillion times and never got tired of hearing it. My girl friends and I would pantomime it in front of a mirror. LOL We would make hand gestures, like chopping the air. I guess we thought that was cool....
Thanks for the sweet memory, Brigid. I like the Cash one, too.