Deborah Hopkinson provides a lively account of John Lomax’s efforts to document and record American folk music and cowboy songs of the west. Lomax loved learning and loved music and singing, especially cowboy songs. “The songs went straight to John’s heart, and he made up his mind to write down each and every cowboy song he heard.” Lomax did just that, even turning it into a project for a college class, only to be dismissed by his professor: “There’s nothing of value in these songs of plain, ordinary folk.” Lomax believed differently, and the methods he developed began with respect for those plain, ordinary folk and the music they sang. “Home on the Range,” “Git Along Little Dogies,” and “Sweet Betsy from Pike” are among the works he helped preserve in his pioneering efforts. Additional information on Lomax and his work is provided in an author’s note following Hopkinson’s engaging narrative. (Ages 7–10)