Charlie Poole

When Charlie Poole died at age thirty-nine in 1931 after a three-month alcohol binge that
was prodigious even by his own daunting standards, his death certificate identified him as a
"mill worker." And, indeed, the onset of the Depression had sent him back to labor in the
North Carolina mills he had escaped by virtue of his wanderlust and his prowess as a singer
and banjo player. That blunt job description, however, ignores the fact that, in t... More >