Tracking Down John Henry
John Henry is a centenary artifact of American folklore. Through music, literature, and other art, he has remained an enduring icon of Appalachian and Southern mythology for over 100 years, representing the confluence of the post-bellum South and the Westward expansion of the Industrial Revolution. A symbolic figure, his identity has evolved with hundreds of iterations on the ballad of his life, carrying with it numerous embedded meanings.
As an idyllic, masculine prototype, Henry depicts "the divinity of labor," the effort and struggle of the working class, and collective understanding of sacrifice for progress' sake.
As a symbol of that progress and those left behind, Henry’s tale and its transmission mirrors the serpentine journey of the very rails he (allegedly) tied down, connecting distinct communities across the landscape. His tale has been handed down through the oral tradition and broadcast by the Blues, Appalachian Folk, Country & Western, and even symphonic orchestra.
The goal of this article is to highlight the rich history of Henry's legend, its transmission, and the embedded meanings of identity and belonging that fill the gaps of his story.
The earliest record of John Henry's ballad comes from a mention of the song "Johnnie Henry" in the Journal of American Folklore, documented by Louise Rand Bascom in 1909. Given the transmission of song through oral tradition, it is impossible for us to know exactly how many versions of his song have been gifted to the ether. 
As part of my research, and with assistance from this great compilation by Christopher Bradley, I have compiled a living playlist of representative recordings of extant and new versions of his song. This collection shares traditional blues and string band recordings like those I grew up listening to and through reverse chronological order, highlights many new offerings that borrow on contemporary styles and their fusion. Though dominated by similar recordings to the former subgroup, this growing compilation highlights some of the literary borrowing and subtextual amplification of themes associated with John Henry in diverse styles such as a programmatic symphonic work by Aaron Copland, a driving fusion of rap and bluegrass fueled by body percussion, and an expansive film score title track.
Amongst the wide range of representations in music as well as literature, film, theater, art, media, and subsequent scholarly and journalistic discussion, Henry's image emerges as a sum of the critical mass of reproduction. Stretching back to the turn of the 20th century through the modern era, this wealth of material has served to fuel his locomotive tale on an unending journey down the liminal tracks of the American collective consciousness. Through his collective memory, every storyteller and their audience has shared in forming their own version(s) of the man, myth, and legend.
For audiences and creators alike, it is important to analyze this history to better understand the very real environments in which we situate this tale. As an iconic figure with more than a lifetime of history, Henry and the research, production and dissemination of his legend carry important understandings of the power relations of society past and present, and specific narratives of identity and belonging for a wide audience of participants. These narratives, both overt and subliminal, are shared in physical locations but also in imagined communities, radically expanded by our modern access to information. (see Weedon, "Identity and Culture" and "Collective Memory.")
For folks like myself who chose to engage with this folklore, there is a significant body of produced guidelines for ethical considerations of such issues. 
As outlined by the Folklore Fellows and The Folklore Society, participation in folklore requires an informed perspective of ethical considerations for the research, production, publication, and education of folklore.
These guidelines strongly advocate acknowledgement of your position as a researcher, the topic of your project, your goal, method and audience, the medium of accessibility, and the implications and result of your project.
This also requires understanding of general research ethics including transparency, informed consent, intellectual property, informant rights, safeguarding vulnerable populations, and integrity and fidelity of data collection.
So what meanings do works about John Henry carry and what do they say about the topic, audience and creator?
The most frequent commonalities of lyrics and textual reference would tell us that John Henry was an upright, hardworking man living amidst the working-class ascension of Black America in the aftermath of the late 1800's. With herculean strength, Henry devoted himself to self-reliant effort, utilizing a hammer of varying weight (generally accepted as exceptionally heavy) to drive further into the dark uncertainty of the future. This symbol serves as both the token of his bootstraps ethos, but also as a representation of resistance, struggle, and freedom, or even a euphemism for his hubris or physical prowess. As Jake Maynard puts it, "the hammer can be either a curse or a sabot — a reminder of the fate of the Black laborer or a tool to fight against it."
The focus of his efforts is generally accepted as driving steel in the process of boring a railroad tunnel which eventually becomes his "cold, dark grave." This struggle is highlighted in lyrical depictions through the introduction of his mechanical antagonist, the steam drill and it's accompanied lieutenant 'The Captain,' as well as by scholars and novelists as the indicative of the plight of the real world's working class. With each swing of the hammer, Henry drives another nail in his coffin. "Each day [his] progress measured by the extent to which [he] extend[s] the darkness. How deep [he] dig[s] [his] grave” (see Inscoe, "Race and Remembrance in West Virginia: John Henry for a Post-Modern Age.")
With these devices come attached underpinnings which speak to the intentions, beliefs, and understandings of creators and audience alike, carrying weight which can add to inclusive, shared consensus or divisive, hurtful remembrance of cultural artifacts which no longer serve us. As mentioned before, much of the canon reinforces Booker T. Washington's bootstraps ethos, and with that the implications of that ideology in today's conservative America, where many of these portrayals are located. There is also the understanding of the toll that America's working class bears to provide that 'American elbow grease,' which is disproportionately shared amongst the Black community and reflected by the term "John Henryism" in the medical literature. These are balanced by more altruistic, positively-valanced and universal themes of upward mobility, service, and martyrdom for the (arguably) greater good: the progress of society.  Other unifying themes include shared lifeways and artifacts from America's working class across ethnic and cultural groups, and the prevailing sentiment of a fear of replacement: the timeless trepidation that our future America may not have a place for the very people who will build it.
All of these underpinnings are synonymous with the communities that have sustained Henry's legacy. Working class America, across racial delineations, has historically been the ironic foil to its advancement. As lecturer Tex Sample states: 
"to live in the bottom third of the American class structure whatever your race – is to be immersed in the rituals and liturgies of inequality. It is to live in a world where you basically take orders but do not give them, and where you must shut your mouth and offer unreciprocated respect." 
This unifying social condition is shared amongst the traditional communities that provided us with Henry's story. Their musical styles were homogenized through cultural appropriation encouraged by the commercial oversight of the recording industry, which sought to lump distinct folk musics into a marketable subcategory. The entwining influences of musical practices within this canon mirror lifeways and cultural traditions of these populations, offering a pluralistic view of regional and socioeconomic identity. In this way, every version of John Henry sang into the world or written down communicates an embedded identity that recruits its audience to feel a sense of belonging to their version of an idyllic America, whether it is one left behind in the dust of progress or as the aim for our future expansion. 
For a seemingly innocuous tune about a railroad worker, Henry's ballad carries with it serious implications that are proliferated through what we chose to remember and how we chose to sing his song. As succinctly put by Professor Bernard Asbell, "singers have changed it to suit their musical and poetic tastes, or remade it to fill in for their failing memories."
With that utility comes great responsibility. By filling in the gaps of our memory with specific artifacts or familiar narratives, we create a version of the man that facilitates transmission of both musical and subtextual messages that have the power to reinforce narratives. Narratives that can unify or divide; uplifting or subverting identity and belonging.
Folklorists should consider these implications, acknowledging hegemonic ideologies that have shaped the legacy thus far, and consider their position as they seek to add value to the tale. Folklore is living history which says as much about a character as it does about those who write it, sing it, and share it.
Sources
“American Railroad: A Musical Journey of Reclamation.” Silkroad. https://www.silkroad.org/american-railroad.
Asbell, Bernard. “A Man Ain’t Nothin’ But A Man.” https://www.americanheritage.com/man-aint-nothin-man.
Bentley, Larry, Appalachian Murder, Mystery And Legend. “John Henry, Steel Driving Man.” https://open.spotify.com/episode/6VIqBKMuzQTE7lQJSzCjyz?si=oioVrfboSPSzVSJ0eDkb8g&t=315.
Bradley, Christopher. “Songs about John Henry - Ordinary Times.” https://ordinary-times.com/2021/01/14/songs-about-john-henry/.
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Fernander, Anita F et al. “John Henry Active Coping, education, and blood pressure among urban blacks.” https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2594971/.
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Garon, Paul. Abaa.org. “John Henry: The Ballad and the Legend.” https://www.abaa.org/member-articles/john-henry-the-ballad-and-the-legend.
Inscoe, John C. “Race and Remembrance in West Virginia: John Henry for a Post-Modern Age.” http://www.jstor.org/stable/41446608.
James, S.A. “John Henryism and the health of African-Americans.” https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01379448.
Lane, Ron. West Virginia Humanities Council. “E-WV - Great Bend Tunnel.” Wvencyclopedia.org, 2024. https://wvencyclopedia.org/entries/2090.
Maynard, Jake. “John Henry and the Divinity of Labor.” https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/2021/07/john-henry-and-the-divinity-of-labor.
Millette, Christopher. “John Henry Statue.” https://www.wvgazettemail.com/john-henry-statue/image_9c803a16-69e2-11ef-95d4-7739507b2581.html.
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Painter, Nell Irvin. “Blacks in Appalachia.” http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt130ht38.
Sample, Tex. “‘Laughing at What I Love’: Notes on White Working-Class America.” https://reflections.yale.edu/article/future-race/laughing-what-i-love-notes-white-working-class-america.
Smithsonian Institute. “Folk Heroes: John Henry.” https://postalmuseum.si.edu/exhibition/art-of-the-stamp-the-artwork-legends/folk-heroes-john-henry.
Wagner, Wolfgang. “Social Representation Theory: An Historical Outline.” https://oxfordre.com/psychology/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190236557.001.0001/acrefore-9780190236557-e-606.
Weedon, Chris, and Glenn Jordan. 2012. “Collective Memory: Theory and Politics.” https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/49199/.
Weedon, Chris. “Identity and Culture : Narratives of Difference and Belonging.” https://public.ebookcentral.proquest.com/choice/publicfullrecord.aspx?p=295527.
Williams, Brett. West Virginia Humanities Council. “E-WV - John Henry.” https://www.wvencyclopedia.org/entries/336.
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