"Sweet Singer of the Swamplands Here To Do a Few Tunes Between Homicides"

-New York Tribune, January 5, 1935, heralding the arrival of Leadbelly.

In 1935 Huddie Ledbetter finished a four year stint in swampy Angola. He then walked away from the world he’d known for some 47 years -- that of rural hardship -- into the curious life of Harvard-educated folklorist John Lomax. They soon sped toward New York City, where Leadbelly was to give performances for Amer...