Nimrod Workman Enters the National Recording Registry
4 days ago
Nimrod Workman was a Kentucky-born coal miner, trade unionist, and folk singer who worked in the mines from age fourteen until black lung and a slipped disc forced him to retire in his mid-fifties. He spent the rest of his life performing songs about the mines, religion, and Appalachia. Nimrod was born in Martin County, Kentucky, but spent most of his life in Chattaroy, West Virginia, where he worked and made music. Nimrod received widespread recognition for his songs, performing at Appalshop’s Seedtime on the Cumberland Festival, The Smithsonian Folklife Festival, and the 1982 World’s Fair. In 1986, Nimrod was a recipient of a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. He spent his later years in Tennessee, passing in Knoxville in November 1994 after ninety-nine long years of life, leaving a lasting legacy of music, labor organizing, and storytelling.
And now, Appalshop is proud to share that Nimrod’s legacy will further be solidified, as the Nimrod Workman Collection at Appalshop is being added to the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress. This is a highly selective process, intended to “showcase the range and diversity of American recorded sound heritage in order to increase preservation awareness.” Only 25 selections are made per year, making this a prestigious honor and true commendation of Nimrod’s contributions to music and culture.
“The National Recording Registry includes many well-known performers and performances,” states Matt Barton, Recorded Sound Curator for the Library of Congress. “But it also includes recordings of people such as Nimrod Workman, who are not well known though they are emblematic of American experience, history and art, and this is reflected in the interviews, stories and songs that he recorded for Appalshop, which continue to move, delight and inform people long after his passing.”
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We were proud to partner with @DimeStoreRadio to make this celebratory announcement on social media, who shared some of our archival footage of Workman performing “Wayfaring Stranger” and celebrated this achievement with us. We are grateful for their efforts in preserving American folk music and traditional arts, and sharing those arts with a wider audience.
To celebrate this achievement, we have made the album Passing Thru the Garden (produced by Jack Wright) available on a Free/Pay-What-You-Want digital download on Bandcamp for the month of April. Passing Thru the Garden, a collaborative album between Nimrod and his daughter, folk musician Phyllis Boyens, is JAA001—the very first release from June Appal Recordings!
You can also watch Nimrod Workman: To Fit My Own Category, a 1976 Appalshop Film directed by Scott Faulkner and Anthony Slone, for free on Appalshop’s Youtube channel. We also encourage you to explore some of the Nimrod Workman materials available on the .
We are proud to see Nimrod’s legacy be nationally recognized, and we hope you’ll celebrate with us.
