Tale of Folk Hero Wins New Award For Arts Writing

While researching his previous book he stumbled onto reports from the board of the Virginia State Penitentiary in Richmond that told, he writes, "a terrible story about railroad work." In the early 1870s, black convicts were leased to the C&O Railroad, which was running a line across the Alleghenies. Many died doing tunneling and other work for the C&O.

Later, Nelson got interested in African American work songs and was drawn to the ballad of John Henry and his fatal contest with a steam drill. One day he ran across an old photograph of the Richmond penitentiary that showed "a large white building in the center." He found himself suddenly putting two disparate bits of information together: a conversation he'd had with an archivist about nearly 300 skeletons discovered near the penitentiary buildings, and a stanza from one version of the song:

They took John Henry to the white house,

And buried him in the san'

And every locomotive come roarin' by,

Says there lays that steel drivin' man . . .

Hypothesizing that the building in the photograph was the "white house" in question, Nelson checked penitentiary records and found a "John Wm. Henry" who'd been sent to work on the C&O. More research supported -- though it cannot prove -- his belief that he'd found a legend's origin.

In the second part of his book, Nelson said, he addresses the question: "How does this become a song?" It's this question that makes it possible to categorize "Steel Drivin' Man" as arts writing.

"There are almost 200 recorded versions of the ballad of John Henry," he writes at one point. "It was among the first of the songs that came to be called 'the blues' and it was one of the first recorded 'country' songs."

This varied musical legacy gave Oates an idea for improving on Nelson's hardback text.

"I think it would be ideal if this came back in paperback with a CD of the songs," she said.