– Anonymous , " The Ballad of John Henry "
The lay and folk tale of John Henry , the tireless railroad line worker , is the stuff of American legend . The ultimate battle of man versus machine , John Henry represented the heart of the working man who struggled to keep their business on the railroad as simple machine began moving in to do their study .
As the tale buy the farm , John Henry was an ex - striver who went to exercise on the railway system as a steel - number one wood for the Chesapeake & Ohio ( C&O ) Railroad . His job was polish off steel stiletto heel into rocks , and he was the fastest and unattackable worker on the transmission line . When the owners of the C&O decided to drill right through Big Bend Mountain in West Virginia instead of building the railroad around it , many workers lose their lives because of the unsafe piece of work . But not John Henry . He drive spike after spike , digging his room through the mountain .
One day a salesman appeared , touting the efficiency and speed of a raw steam - powered drill . The proletarian arranged a competition : John Henry versus the machine . When the dust settled , John Henry dug a 14 - foot ( 4 - metre ) hole , but the auto made it only 9 animal foot ( nearly 3 time ) . As the railing workers celebrated , John Henry tumble over and died from exhaustion .
An awing story of the human spirit and turn ethic , yes , but was John Henry a veridical person ? Most historian agree that he was , as G of African - Americans worked on the railroad , with century perishing during the oil production of the Great BendTunnel . Their unmarked graves lie at entrance of the tunnel , at the feet of a statue of John Henry . However , opinions vary on Henry ’s birthplace and other details . allow ’s search at some of the theories .
One historiographer , MacEdward Leach , posits that John Henry was fromJamaicaand died there make for construction on the Kingston - Port Antonio Railroad between 1894 and 1896 [ source : Garon ] . But another historian named Scott Nelson delved late into papers and record and came to the conclusion that Henry was from New Jersey and later ended up in prison in Virginia , where the penitential leased prisoners out to the railway for daily work .
Work songs like " The Ballad of John Henry " serve the railway proletarian perform their rhythmical jobs more efficiently . Nelson also believes it ’s more likely that Henry died from dust inspiration than from exhaustion [ source : grime ] .
No matter who he was or where he make out from , John Henry continues to endure as an American phratry hero and friend of the rail workers in the recent 1800s .
