Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Woodie Guthrie's New Years Resolution List, 1942
Business Insider ^ | Dec. 31, 1941 /Dec. 27, 2013 | Woody Guthrie

Posted on 12/31/2013 12:52:56 PM PST by Mrs. Don-o

If you're having trouble nailing down your New Year's resolutions, here's a good place to start.

Seventy years ago, American folk legend Woody Guthrie scribbled in his journal a list of 33 tasks he would dedicate himself to in the coming year. According to WoodyGuthrie.org, he called them "Rulin's."

At age 31, he was in the prime of his life, with a wife and three kids, as well as a good deal of life experience, having survived the Dust Bowl to make it out to California.

As a result, it's a pretty unbeatable list. Check it out:


1. Work more and better
2. Work by a schedule
3. Wash teeth if any
4. Shave
5. Take bath
6. Eat good — fruit — vegetables — milk
7. Drink very scant if any
8. Write a song a day
9. Wear clean clothes — look good
10. Shine shoes
11. Change socks
12. Change bed cloths often
13. Read lots good books
14. Listen to radio a lot
15. Learn people better
16. Keep rancho clean
17. Dont get lonesome
18. Stay glad
19. Keep hoping machine running
20. Dream good
21. Bank all extra money 22. Save dough
23. Have company but dont waste time
24. Send Mary and kids money
25. Play and sing good
26. Dance better
27. Help win war — beat fascism
28. Love mama
29. Love papa
30. Love Pete
31. Love everybody
32. Make up your mind
33. Wake up and fight

(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; History; Humor; Music/Entertainment
KEYWORDS: communist; eat; leftwingscumbag; shave; sing; socialist; work
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-6061-66 next last

This particular list, penned by the great Woody Guthrie in 1942 at the tender-but-just-wise-enough age of 30, is an absolute gem of humor, earnestness, and pure humanity.

"Take it easy, but take it."
Woodie Guthrie

1 posted on 12/31/2013 12:52:56 PM PST by Mrs. Don-o
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Mrs. Don-o

The original dirty hippie


2 posted on 12/31/2013 12:56:55 PM PST by turducken
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Mrs. Don-o

I was just thinking of Woodie Guthrie today. The song I couldn’t remember was “This Land is Your Land.” It’s a convoluted story that wanders through “Doctor Who” and my childhood in California in the 70s.


3 posted on 12/31/2013 12:58:01 PM PST by Tax-chick (The superpowers ascribed to "feminists" make me wish I was one.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: turducken

3. Wash teeth if any
4. Shave
5. Take bath
9. Wear clean clothes — look good
10. Shine shoes
11. Change socks

I wish I could get my kids to do all this ... also “Change underwear,” but that’s probably included in #9.


4 posted on 12/31/2013 12:59:56 PM PST by Tax-chick (The superpowers ascribed to "feminists" make me wish I was one.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Tax-chick
The song I couldn’t remember was “This Land is Your Land.”

The Communist national anthem, written and performed by an authentic Communist. How easily we were seduced.

5 posted on 12/31/2013 1:17:15 PM PST by Bernard Marx
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Mrs. Don-o

It’s amazing that someone could have so many of the clues and still reach all the wrong conclusions.


6 posted on 12/31/2013 1:17:42 PM PST by rockrr (Everything is different now...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Mrs. Don-o
С Новым годом, Comrade Guthrie!
7 posted on 12/31/2013 1:19:15 PM PST by Fiji Hill
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Bernard Marx

*shrug*

I always thought it was very Manifest Destiny, “This land was made for you and me.”


8 posted on 12/31/2013 1:19:46 PM PST by Tax-chick (The superpowers ascribed to "feminists" make me wish I was one.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Mrs. Don-o

Guthrie was a philosophical communist. While Guthrie claimed to have joined the American Communist Party, there is no conclusive evidence that he ever did. What he did do was write 174 columns under the title of Woody Sez for the Communist Party newspaper, The Daily Worker. Among these columns, he heaped praise upon Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, even defending Stalin’s unprovoked invasion of Poland in 1939!I have no respect for him.


9 posted on 12/31/2013 1:22:50 PM PST by ohiobushman ( If people evolved from apes, why are there still apes?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: don-o

Mrs. Don-o loves Don-o.

10 posted on 12/31/2013 1:23:14 PM PST by Mrs. Don-o (Praise God from Whom all blessings flow, / Praise Him all people here below.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Bernard Marx; Tax-chick
I prefer the gospel song whose melody Comrade Guthrie ripped off when he wrote "This Land":

The Fire Song--The Carter Family

11 posted on 12/31/2013 1:23:49 PM PST by Fiji Hill
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Bernard Marx

Yet today, Guthrie would be far to the right of many Republicans.


12 posted on 12/31/2013 1:24:42 PM PST by Responsibility2nd (NO LIBS. This Means Liberals and (L)libertarians! Same Thing. NO LIBS!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Tax-chick

“Turn Underwear Inside Out When Needed.”


13 posted on 12/31/2013 1:25:22 PM PST by JaguarXKE (1973: Reporters investigate All the President's Men. 2013: Reporters ARE all the President's men)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: Mrs. Don-o
27. Help win war — beat fascism

It's a pretty safe bet that Comrade Woody's list of New Years resolutions for 1941 contained nothing whatsoever about beating fascism.

14 posted on 12/31/2013 1:27:43 PM PST by Fiji Hill
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: turducken
Hippie? I dunno. Had a wife and 3 kids, didn't do drugs, and a regular job.

Kept clean, too, for a working man.

15 posted on 12/31/2013 1:27:45 PM PST by Mrs. Don-o (Praise God from Whom all blessings flow, / Praise Him all people here below.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: JaguarXKE

Unnngh.


16 posted on 12/31/2013 1:29:13 PM PST by Tax-chick (The superpowers ascribed to "feminists" make me wish I was one.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: Bernard Marx

I read the lyrics and don’t find reference to communist ideology written therein. What are you talking about? (must have missed it somewhere)


17 posted on 12/31/2013 1:30:34 PM PST by Let_It_Be_So (Once you see the Truth, you cannot "unsee" it, no matter how hard you may try.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Fiji Hill

Never heard that, thanks for posting.

I still don’t think there’s anything Communist in the lyrics of “This Land is Your Land.”


18 posted on 12/31/2013 1:32:38 PM PST by Tax-chick (The superpowers ascribed to "feminists" make me wish I was one.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: Fiji Hill

You nailed it! Until Hitler broke his nonagression pact with Stalin & invaded the USSR in June 1941, Guthrie was a good little commie like all the others who chanted “The Yanks Are Not Coming!” & preached strict isolationism.

After June 22nd, the commies in America began chanting “The Yanks Are Not Coming Too Late!!” and the alliance with “our heroic Soviet ally” was a matter of Party discipline while Comrade Woody inscribed his guitar with “This Machine Kills Fascists!” and hit the road for the war effort.

Since 1967 Woody Guthrie has been First Peoples’ Commissar of Soviet Hell.


19 posted on 12/31/2013 1:40:22 PM PST by elcid1970 ("In the modern world, Muslims are living fossils.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: elcid1970
Since 1967 Woody Guthrie has been First Peoples’ Commissar of Soviet Hell.

I see what you did there. (In the Kingston Trio version.) My mother was into folk music in the 70s.

20 posted on 12/31/2013 1:44:16 PM PST by Tax-chick (The superpowers ascribed to "feminists" make me wish I was one.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-6061-66 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson