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5 min readThe song that fueled protests and a legacy of hope
It is not a marching song. It is not necessarily defiant. It is a promise: "We shall overcome someday." That phrase has been heard in North Korea, in Beirut, in Tiananmen Square, and in South Africa's Soweto Township. But before it became the anthem of the civil rights movement, it began as something far humbler—a folk song, a work song sung by enslaved people in the fields who would sing, "I'll be all right some day."
From work song to union song
The song's first documented political use came in 1945 in Charleston, South Carolina, during a strike against the American Tobacco Company. Workers were making 45 cents an hour and wanted a raise. They marched and sang together on the picket line: "We will overcome, and we will win our right someday." Decades later, in a 1989 PBS documentary, striker Corinne Chisholm recalled that when they first started singing it, she thought it was "kind of silly." But as the strike went along, she said, "It gave me a whole lot of encouragement and believing that we would overcome and it made me fight that much harder and we did overcome. We won it."
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:23) **Introduction: The Song That Keeps Creeping Up** - The hosts introduce the episode as part of the "America in Pursuit" series, revealing that a single song—"We Shall Overcome"—has been a recurring sonic thread in their recent stories about the nation's 250-year pursuit of happiness.
- 2 (03:13) **What "We Shall Overcome" Is Not** - The report begins by defining the song's essence, distinguishing it from a simple marching tune.
- 3 (03:56) **Origins: From Slave Fields to Church Hymns** - The report traces the song's earliest roots, establishing its long history before it became a political tool.
- 4 (04:09) **First Political Use: The 1945 Tobacco Workers' Strike** - The song's debut as a protest anthem is documented in a labor strike in Charleston, South Carolina.
- 5 (05:35) **The Highlander Folk Center: A Crucible for the Song** - The song travels to Tennessee, where it is adapted and spread by the Highlander Folk Center, a pioneering school for labor and civil rights organizing.
- 6 (07:13) **Pete Seeger's Transformation** - Zilphia Horton introduces the song to folk legend Pete Seeger in New York City, who alters its rhythm and lyrics.
- 7 (08:43) **Guy Carawan and the Shift to Civil Rights** - The song finds a new champion in Guy Carawan, who brings it to Highlander just as the center's focus shifts from labor to the burgeoning civil rights movement.
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