A Chance to Survive

 A Chance to Survive: How FDR's Hidden Music Unit South to Save America from the Great Depression--One Song at a Time, by Sheryl Kaskowitz, 272 pgs. © 2024

This was an fascinating read. As part of FDR's New Deal, a special agency is created to help bring the arts to resettlement towns, which are towns and encampments meant to transition destitute farmers and migrants during the great depression into planned communities. This was a huge agency that's main goal was to boost morale of Americans through the arts, specifically music--the music unit within the Resettlement Agency was even led by Charles Seeger, father of banjo folk-hero Pete Seeger. The book focuses on two women who were a boon to the success of the program, doing the most work and receiving the least amount of credit. The women learn to use the latest in recording technology and travel to the different resettlement towns, recording the folk songs and music of the community, bringing joy and optimism during a very bleak period in American history--the 1930s music program  is credited with the renewed interest in folk music that took place in the 1950s.