Woody Guthrie and the
Bonneville Power Administration
In the spring of 1941, BPA hired a then-unknown folk singer named Woody Guthrie to record songs about the Columbia River hydroelectric system. He traveled the region and wrote 26 songs in 30 days, including classics such as "Roll On, Columbia," "Pastures of Plenty," and "Grand Coulee Dam."
Read more about Woody Guthrie, the Columbia River songs, and this exciting period in American history in this
excerpt by Alan Lomax, the late folk song archivist with the Library of Congress.