John Henry

John Henry legendary African American famous for his strength, celebrated in ballads and tales. In the most popular version of the story, John Henry tries to outwork a steam drill with only his hammer and steel bit. Although he succeeds in beating the machine, he dies of the strain. His legend originated c.1870 among the miners drilling the Big Bend Tunnel of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway in West Virginia and may have some historical basis.

Bibliography: See study by S. R. Nelson (2006).

John Henry, hero of a cycle of Negro ballads and tall tales, a “natchal man,” born in the “Black River country, where the sun don't never shine,” who is sometimes a steel driver in the building of the “Yaller Dog” or “Yaller Ball” railroad line for “Mister Billie Bob Russell,” sometimes a roustabout on riverboats. Other figures in the ballads and tales include John Hardy, the gambler; innumerable rivals of John Henry, all named Sam; and the women, Poor Selma, Julie Ann, and Ruby. John Henry's chief exploit is his competition with a steam drill in driving steel, in which he drives faster than the machine, but dies, “with his hammer in his hand,” as a result of the exertion. In some versions, the contest is with a steam winch in loading cotton on a riverboat. The legend seems to have originated c. 1870, when an actual John Henry of such a contest may have existed. The ballads about John Hardy may have arisen from the same source, but their hero differs from John Henry in that he comes to a bad end, murdering a man and dying on the gallows. Roark Bradford's John Henry (1931) combines and reconciles the various tales, while Guy B. Johnson's John Henry: Tracking Down a Negro Legend (1931) is a collection of variants of the ballads.