Woody Guthrie is the greatest musical/social/political person to ever come out of Oklahoma. He was the voice of a generation during the Dust Bowl, and spoke to the everyday hardships that working folks went through.
The music he sang and wrote was a perfect representation of the best aspects of Oklahoma history. He learned the blues from an old black man in Okemah, which, as everybody knows, is the only good way to learn the blues. He had a strong political streak from the hotbed of populist socialism that formed Oklahoma's political landscape in the Territorial days to the depression. Most of all he was a man who straddled the economic and social classes of America and bridged the gap between intellectual east coasters and the middle American progressive farmers and union workers.
Woody built upon the music and writings of those who came before him to create song about underdogs and hope.
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