Anchor Struck

Spring continues to spring back and forth on the farm. Yesterday was drizzly but allowed enough sunshine in to embolden the barn swallows to continue constructing their nest on the east eave of our house. They are amazing little buggers. Literally. They feed on insects coming off the pond near our house, swooping around in patterns that Top Gun pilots can only dream of.

Change is definitely in the air. Its elusiveness has my mind awanderin’, and today it wandered to Shreveport, Louisiana. My family moved there in 1959 from a small Missouri town, where I had Black friends and schoolmates. The blatant racism in Shreveport — separate public water fountains, even — blew my 12-year-old mind.

About four months before we hit town, Soul/R&B legend Sam Cooke was refused service by a hotel there, even though Cooke had made a phone reservation. He and his group were arrested. That and many other influences inspired the song. Cooke wrote the first draft of it while participating in sit-ins at Durham, North Carolina.

“A Change Is Gonna Come” was recorded January 30, 1964. It wasn’t until December of that year that it was released on the 22nd, eleven days after Cooke was shot to death when he attacked a motel manager.