Labor on the Move In Memoriam: Utah Phillips Moves On Down The Road

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)
Utah Phillips, a seminal figure in American folk music who performed extensively and tirelessly for audiences for 38 years, died Friday of congestive heart failure in Nevada City, California. The son of labor organizers, Phillips demonstrated a lifelong concern with the living conditions of working people and was a proud member of the Industrial Workers of the World, popularly known as "the Wobblies," as well as an archivist, historian, activist, philosopher, hobo, tramp, "and just about everything in between." "He took the stories of working people and railroad bums and he built them into work that was influenced by writers like Thomas Wolfe," said singer Rosalie Sorrels, "but then he gave it back, he put it in language so the people whom the songs and stories were about still had them, still owned them. He didn't believe in stealing culture from the people it was about."