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DROP KICK ME, JESUS, through the goalposts of life

The Anglo-Celtic music that inspired Guthrie via the Carter Family and inspired the Dropkick Murphys via the Dubliners was a crucial connection point. But just as important, if not more so, was the shared commitment to bettering the lives of working people. Guthrie not only wrote songs about farmworkers (“Pastures of Plenty”), organized labor (“Union Maid”) and immigrants (“Deportees”), he also sang to those people in schools, union halls and outdoor camps.