This weekend there is going to be an estate sale at the former home of a local Milwaukee truck driver, labor rights activist, and folk song writer and singer named Larry Penn. Larry is deceased, and I do not recollect ever meeting him. But many of his songs were about trains, from a labor perspective (one song is “End of Train Device”) and according to this online article, he wrote an entire LP of songs about John Allen and the Gorre & Daphetid!
http://singout.org/2014/10/15/remembering-larry-penn/
The estate sale is said to include HO trains and other stuff. I wonder if copies of that LP are going to be sold – hmmm, my old turntable still works …
Dave Nelson
Dave,
Wow, you never know what will turn up on the internet. A quick search turned up the track “JohnAllen’s Railroad” on Smithsonian’s Folways website. You can listen to a sample or buy it. Right now, not working for my cranky old XP box, but maybe someon else will have better luck.
http://www.folkways.si.edu/larry-penn/john-allens-railroad/american-folk/music/track/smithsonian
Listening to a sample for free wasn’t happening for me, but that doesn’t surprise me since lots of stuff is iffy here on this box. Did manage to buy a copy and well worth my investment. Coming in at just over 2:30 it’s typical folkie Fare, from around 1980 vintage. Yeah, a bit of commentray on the human condition, it is a folk song after all, but there’s lots of model RR stuff, too, like “crossing the Akin Mtns at Great Divide” or something similar. And his locomotive whistles blew!, which in 1980 was still a remarkable thing, less so nowadays, of course.[;)]
Well I went to the estate sale of the late Larry Penn this weekend - bought some HO rolling stock, books, and some parts, and yeah I bought an LP of his songs for $10 (never opened and sealed in plastic). The article I cited was a bit misleading – only one song on the LP is about John Allen, not the entire disc (which is on the theme of working and working men and bad capitalists and other such labor activist fare). Larry’s guitar playing is lovely; his voice is rough-hewn, and the point of the song is that John Allen’s railroad didn’t steal anyone’s land, destroy rare trees to make ties, kill off workers due to greed and avarice, never kicked off a hobo, and so on – and it doesn’t run anymore which is the repeated phrase. His politics are not my politics but that’s what makes a horse race. There wasn’t a left wing or labor cause that he didn’t seem to support whole heartedly (the flyers were in his books and laying about everywhere), but the ample evidence of a deep Catholic faith is a good indication that a communist of the Soviet/Stalinist variety he was not.
There is a surprising amount of his music on YouTube by the way, much of it sung by him, including a truly gorgeous train song called Time to Go - sung by a folk song duo with substantially prettier voices than Larry’s. I’d rank it right up there with City of New Orleans as far as train songs go it’s that nice. The John Allen song is not on YouTube but some other rail songs sung by Larry are.
Larry was quite a craftsman. Model trains were only one of his interests; ships and airplanes ranked high and he was both a scratchbuilder of planes and boats and an avid builder of kits for all his interests. His layout was nothing special but the track was all hand-laid on TruScale milled roadbed, and his careful and neat-as-a-pin wiring was visible when you pulled at the central control panel. All his magazines and catalogs and boo
Dave,
Thanks for the interesting report on the estate sale and the review of the song about John Allen. I think you nailed it in terms of who Larry saw Allen’s RR in light of the way many see reall RRs.
Shelves of unbuilt kits?That sure sounds like a fellow most here could relate to. And based on all the other lefty folk singers I’ve known, I’m sure he’d been happy to do lunch to talk about trains or politics, as best suits. Unfortunate that didn’t happen, but I suspect he’d be glad to meet you and talk trains.
All right up my alley, as the former greivance officer for the grad student union here at Illinois. I can also report that Larry was hardly the only socialist model railroader in Milwaukee. Frank Zeidler, the last Socialist mayor of Milwaukee (until 1960) was a charter member of the NMRA. When he was in town for a union- and History Department-sponsored talk back in the early 90s (I’m a townie, so this was before my time in the dept), I asked for his autograph and whipped out my NMRA membership card for him to sign. Think I still have it somewhere. At that late date, there weren’t a lot of opportunities to get something signed by a NMRA charter member, no matter what their politics.[swg]
From our brief discussion, I recall that it seemed the modeling bug was something from an earlier era in his life, before he became mayor. He was said to have been a dedicated and hardworking mayor, so I rather think he saw there was no time for hobby time. Still, he seemed to appreciate the opportunity to recall an earlier time when the hobby was important to him. I know I’m not that dedicated to politics and it seems Larry also found time to “build a better world” in more ways than one.[(-D]
Seems to have been a down to earth story teller with a guitar and a sense of humour.
You may have been surprised Dave, could have been a real interesting conservation.
Cheers, the Bear.[;)]