February 19 — FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT, A POOR MAN’S FRIEND, Willie Eason (1997)

In the seemingly obscure music genre of “sacred steel guitar,” no figure looms larger than the Reverend Willie Eason.

Born in rural Georgia in 1921, Eason (pictured above, right) took steel guitar lessons as a boy. He began playing the instrument at the House of God, where his family attended church. Eason was playing churches and revivals throughout the eastern U.S., when he was still a teenager. Today, the electric steel (referred to as “Hawaiian steel” by many) is the dominant instrument in many African-American Holiness Pentecostal churches.

Eason played with such renowned artists as Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the Soul Stirers, and the Blind Boys of Alabama. When he died in 2005, a friend told the Tampa Bay Times that it’s ironic he was known for the sacred steel when “his strong suit was singing.”

Nowhere is that more true than on “Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Poor Man’s Friend,” remembered here on Presidents Day.