Book-A-Day 2: Ain't Nothin But the Man

Ain't Nothing But A Man

My Quest to Find the Real John Henry

by: Scott Reynolds Nelson

I am a self-confessed history buff.  I love all things historical and digging into the past feels a bit like stepping back in time learning secrets that have long been buried.  There is something fascinating about looking at the faces of people in historical photographs and wondering what their life story entailed.  This book was a true winner. 

The Civil War was just over, and all across the South, African-American men were building railroads.  The songs they sang tell their stories, if you know how to listen.

In Ain't Nothing But A Man, historian and author Scott Reynolds Nelson leads the reader through his journey trying to uncover if the American Folktale hero John Henry (the man in the song who was so strong he beat a steam drill in a contest but then laid down his hammer and died) actually existed as a real man.  This nonfiction text reads as a narrative detailing Mr. Nelson's experience from beginning to end and the twists and turns his journey as a historian took him while also providing lots of great information about the role of African-Americans in the development of the southern railroads.  

40,000 men, the largest railroad workforce in the South, were hardly mentioned in the history books.  Why? 

The intrigue of the 40,000 missing men is what originally led Mr. Nelson down the path to uncover the existence of the real John Henry.  He wanted to find out more about the life of African American railroad workers in the post Civil War South.  In the end what he discovered was the original John Henry song was more of a sad warning than a song of celebration and victory.  He leads the reader down what he came to understand about the real John Henry, the treatment of railroad workers during this time period, and why the song was created as a warning to other African Americans at the time.  

I was fascinated by what Mr. Nelson uncovered about the roots of this traditional American folk song and its origins to a real John Henry.   At the end of the book, he explains to readers how they too can be historians and provides advice on where to look for additional information if they'd like to learn more about this bit of history.