This is one of several songs sung by union activist Ruby Rains and her husband Burt. It was written by a man named M.P. Vice and set to the tune of “Beautiful Texas”.

Rains lived in a trailer outside the Farm Security Administration Camp in Arvin, California and were an organizer of the Arvin cotton strike of 1939. She played guitar and on the few recordings we have that were collected by Charles Todd and Robert Sonkin for the Library of Congress. She was from South Arkansas and had taken labor courses in Pomona, California on union organizing.