Old Man Trump

There have been some questions involving the arrest of Fred Trump at the Kl;u Klux Klan rally in 1927 (see episode 102)  Could he have been there to protest the Klan?  Did his presence really imply an acceptance of the Klan's doctrine of white racial superiority.  That his son has eliminated free admissions to National Parks on Martin Luther King Day and Juneteenth might provide a clue as to why Fred Trump was attending a Klan rally that later turned violent.  What is past is prologue.  This still does not address the issue of Fred Trump's attitudes towards African Americans.

One of Fred Trump's renters in his low income apartment empire was none other than Woody Guthrie.  Woody rented an apartment at Beechhaven, one of the Trump properties during the early 1950s. He was disgusted by Trump's racist rental policies   So the story goes, Woody Guthrie had invited some of his African American friends to drop by and this provoked a torrent of angry letters from Fred Trump.  In response, Woody Guthrie wrote a protest song directed at Fred Trump.  Generally speaking Woody Guthrie tended to denounce people such as Hitler in his music, so clearly he had to be annoyed by the assertion that his landlord had the right to determine who was allowed to visit him at his home.

Since 2015, many people have rediscovered this work by one of America's great composers, the author of "This Land is Your Land."  Give a listen and see what you think.

https://youtu.be/QOC9VxBWmaw?si=L8JzxwizQofE79wu