Zilphia Horton (April 14, 1910 – April 11, 1956) was an American

musician A musician is someone who Composer, composes, Conducting, conducts, or Performing arts#Performers, performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general Terminology, term used to designate a person who fol ...

community organizer Community organizing is a process where people who live in proximity to each other or share some common problem come together into an organization that acts in their shared self-interest. Unlike those who promote more-consensual community buil ...

educator A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. w ...

Civil Rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' political freedom, freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and ...

activist, and

folklorist Folklore studies (also known as folkloristics, tradition studies or folk life studies in the UK) is the academic discipline devoted to the study of folklore. This term, along with its synonyms, gained currency in the 1950s to distinguish the ac ...

. She is best known for her work with her husband Myles Horton at the Highlander Folk School where she is generally credited with turning such songs as " We Shall Overcome", " We Shall Not Be Moved," and "

This Little Light of Mine "This Little Light of Mine" is a Gospel music, gospel song that originated in the 1920s, when it was first sung in Christian churches and penitentiaries. The hymn is often attributed to evangelist Harry Dixon Loes who is said to have written it ...

" from

hymn A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hymn'' d ...

s into protest songs of the Civil Rights Movement.

Early life

Zilphia was born Zilphia Mae Johnson in the coal mining town of Spadra,

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States. It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma ...

. She was the second child of Robert Guy Johnson and Ora Ermon Howard Johnson. Her father was superintendent of the local coal mine which he later owned and operated, and her mother was a school teacher. While some sources describe her as being of mixed Spanish and Native American heritage, others describe her as white.

Education and career

She was a graduate of the College of the Ozarks University of the Ozarks, where she was trained as a classical musician. After graduating, Horton was determined to use her talents for the better good of the southern working class. Her political interest was awakened by the Presbyterian minister, Claude C. Williams, who attempted to organize her father's workers for the Progressive Miners' Union. She joined the unionization efforts despite her father's disapproval and was disowned by him as a result. In 1935, she attended a workshop at the Highlander Folk School, a social justice leadership training school and cultural center located in Monteagle, Tennessee. Horton arrived at Highlander Folk School, now known as the Highlander Research and Education Center, committed to the idea that music and drama could help organize labor. Months after attending her first Highlander workshop, she married the school's founder, Myles Horton, and began working for the Highlander Folk School. Zilphia Horton had numerous roles at Highlander Folk School, serving as music and drama director from 1938 to 1956. She enhanced the cultural pluralism of the school by developing a curriculum which incorporated and elevated the importance of folk music, dance, and drama. She directed workers'

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors to present experiences of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a Stage (theatre), stage. The performe ...

productions, junior union camps, and various community programs; organized union locals; and led singing at workshops, picket lines, union meetings, and fund-raising concerts. She had students collect

folk song Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be ca ...

religious music Religious music (also sacred music) is a type of music that is performed or composed for Religion, religious use or through religious influence. It may overlap with ritual music, which is music, sacred or not, performed or composed for or as a ri ...

, and union songs around the

South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both west and east. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...

, which she then re-wrote or re-worked into protest songs to serve in political struggles, including labor movements and the Civil rights movement. She is perhaps best known for teaching

Pete Seeger Peter Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014) was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and social activist. He was a fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s and had a string of hit records in the early 1950s as a member of The Weav ...

an early version of "We Shall Overcome," which would become an important civil rights anthem of the twentieth century. Originally an old Baptist hymn, "I Will Be All Right," the song came to Highlander from the picket lines of the 1945–1946 Charleston Cigar Factory strike by the South Carolina CIO Food and Tobacco Workers Union in Charleston. Other musicians credited with transforming the song are Frank Hamilton, Guy Carawan, Candie Carawan, and

. On April 11, 1956, she died after accidentally drinking a glass of

typewriter A typewriter is a Machine, mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of Button (control), keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an i ...

cleaning fluid containing

carbon tetrachloride Carbon tetrachloride, also known by many other names (such as carbon tet for short and tetrachloromethane, also IUPAC nomenclature of inorganic chemistry, recognised by the IUPAC), is a chemical compound with the chemical formula CCl4. It is a n ...

she mistook for water.

Personal life

Zilphia and Myles Horton had two children.

Legacy

Zilphia Horton's papers are deposited in the Tennessee State Library and Archives in

Nashville Nashville, often known as Music City, is the capital and List of municipalities in Tennessee, most populous city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County in Middle Tennessee, locat ...

. A biography, ''A Singing Army: Zilphia Horton and the Highlander Folk School'' by Kim Ruehl, was published by

University of Texas Press The University of Texas Press (or UT Press) is the university press of the University of Texas at Austin. Established in 1950, the Press publishes scholarly and trade books in several areas, including Latin American studies, Caribbean, Caribbea ...

in April, 2021.

Early life

Education and career

Personal life

Legacy

References

Further reading