Oklahoma Capitol makes room for Woody Guthrie

OKLAHOMA CITY -- Dust Bowl troubadour Woody Guthrie's portrait will be hung Thursday at the state Capitol.

Guthrie wrote hundreds of songs after leaving Okemah, Okla., as a teenager, including the folk anthem, This Land Is Your Land.

He is best known for speaking to the plight of displaced Americans during the 1930s with such songs as Hard Travelin' and So Long, It's Been Good to Know You. His Oklahoma Hills is the official Oklahoma State Folk Song.

Artists from Bob Dylan to Bruce Springsteen have called Guthrie a major influence on their careers. His son, Arlo, was an important musical figure in the 1960s and 1970s with such songs as City of New Orleans, and Alice's Restaurant, the comedic saga made into a movie.

Artist Charles Banks Wilson chose Guthrie as the subject when asked to do another Capitol portrait, said state Sen. Charles Ford of Tulsa, president of the Oklahoma Senate Historical Preservation Fund.

The Oklahoma Gazette, the largest weekly newspaper in Oklahoma, is raising money for the portrait and Wilson is donating his fee to the fight against Huntington's Disease, officials said.

Guthrie died in 1967 in New York of Huntington's Disease, a degenerative brain disorder.

Thank you brother for the inspiration.