Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 June 2024
On December 9, 1949, Huddie Ledbetter died in a New York hospital at the age of sixty. This chapter briefly looks at the life that he and Martha remade after their permanent return to New York in early 1936. It also looks at damage caused to Ledbetter’s career by the November 1936 publication of Negro Folk Songs as Sung by Lead Belly, as well as all of the Lomax-driven publicity over the previous two years. In 1939, an altercation at a party hosted by the Ledbetters leads an unsympathetic prosecutor and judge, citing false narratives about Lead Belly, to incarcerate him yet again, this time at Rikers. Released later in 1939, he and Martha continue to build a new life. Over time, Huddie Ledbetter builds a celebrated (but not remunerative) career with significant impact on the folk and labor movements as well as the ongoing evolution of American musical forms, including rock and roll.
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