The Main Stem: The end of the Salt Grass Trail.
McCormick quoted Sam (Lightnin’) Hopkins, a Negro folk singer, who spoke of a Houston unknown to many Houstonians: “The idea of it is that everybody ’round here plays music or makes songs or something. That’s white peoples, colored peoples, that’s them funny French-talking peoples, that’s everybody, what I mean. They all of ’em got music.” McCormick himself has said, “More Englishmen than Houstonians see Houston as a rich source of traditional lore, though otherwise the British think of Houston in clichés.”
Much of the area’s past is deep-etched in folk music. One song was sung by Huddie (Lead Belly) Ledbetter, a Negro convict and perhaps the most famous of colored folk singers. The song, titled “The Midnight Special,” begins:
If you ever go to Houston,
You better walk right,
You better not stagger,
You better not fight.
Sheriff Binford will arrest you,
He will carry you down;
If the jury finds you guilty