Woody Guthrie's Anti-Fascist America
Woody Guthrie's guitar with inscription. Museum of Pop Culture, Seattle The Trump administration has been pressuring the Smithsonian museums to mark the nation's 250th anniversary with exhibitions of "unifying" history. One of the few museums outside of DC to venture a large 250th anniversary show is the Huntington, with "This Land Is…," a sprawling survey of American history . It comes with a twist, featuring in title and content the American folk singer—and earliest Trump critic?—Woody Guthrie. The singer's beef was with the Trump patriarch, Fred Trump. From 1950 to 1953 Guthrie and family lived in Beach Haven Place, a Brooklyn apartment owned by the elder Trump. In letters Guthrie complained about the apartment and its policy of not renting to Blacks. This led to a song, "Beach Haven Place Hate" ("I suppose Old Man Trump knows/Just how much racial hate he stirred up/In the bloodspot of human hearts.") Donald Trump first came to med...
