Folksongs of the Maine Woods

Abstract

During a field trip to the coast of Maine in July, 1956, I drove inland for a one-day side trip to Saponac following a lead on a lumberwoods songstress. Her name was Martha Benson; she was a student at Michigan State University, where I taught a course in American Folklore. Martha was not enrolled in that course, but a friend, who shall remain nameless, turned in a magnificent collection of lumberjack songs, supposedly sung to her by Martha, whose Maine habitat she described in great detail - an isolated tarpaper dwelling in the forests remote from civilization.