Guthrie and Seeger are huge heroes of mine, and absolute dyed-in-the-wool pinko commies. It's really a testament to their persistance and skill as songwriters that they became as popular as they did despite the "Red Scare" and being blacklisted. Always loved bringing in songs by them to do at my last school's "All School Sing" - went over very well at the little anarchist school in the woods. If anyone's interested, here's a playlist of leftie jams I put together a year so ago, some good covers of Seeger/Guthrie songs throughout.
Love that Kottke is on your list. When he starting collaborating with Mike Gordon it made my life better. That's the only way I can say it. A local Guthrie favorite up here in MI is one he wrote about the massacre of unionists miners (and minors!) in Calumet. What a fantastic soul.
My grandmother ralated that my great grandmother was there with her mom and aunts. Her aunt told them to stay at their tables, which they did. She also said that the person that yelled "fire" did so more than once. They yelled it, then ran, than returned and yelled it again, and that's when everyone panicked.
Leo Kottke is a gem. A grumpy motherfucker to the core, who can play the strings off any guitar. 6 and 12-string guitar is one of the most brilliant guitar albums ever made. And he recorded in an empty warehouse, with no heating, in the winter, in someplace like Minneapolis. He had to take breaks all the time to warm up his hands. Recorded it in 2 days, I think? I'm also a fan of his album "My Father's Face. I know a lot of people don't like it when he sings (he says his voice is, "... like goose farts on a foggy morning...") but I love it. Especially the free verse stuff like Jack Gets Up. He's a midwest Bukowski to me.