Hammer Be The Death Of Me By John Henry

511 Words2 Pages

John Henry was a man who decided to work because his family was low on money. He worked as a steel driving man. That means he hammered and used a steel drill to dig into rock to make holes for explosives. These explosives blasted rock to assist in constructing railroad tunnels. The poem states that john Henry went up against a steam-powered hammer in a race and won only to die soon after. The poem states he died after putting his hammer down from stress and was remembered as a legend. The poem uses foreshadowing by saying that his daddy said, “hammer be the death of me.” This is foreshadowing because when he grew up a race against the steam powered drill killed him when his heart gave out from stress after the race. More in depth summary: …show more content…

We know its evening because the poem states “If you wait til the red sun goes down, I’ll get it from the man in the mine.” He then moved on to work for the captain. That job seemed to entail hoisting a jack, using a shovel, and laying down railroad tracks. This can be seen when the poem says, “Well John Henry went to the captain, Said the captain, what can you do, I can hoist a jack, I can lay a track, I can pick up a shovel too.” His final job came when the captain said he would bring a steam drill on the job. Henry said he wasn’t anything but a man before he would let a steam drill beat him down and that he would rather die with a hammer in his hand. That leads us back o the beginning explanation when he literally died after the race against the steam drill due to his heart giving out. The poem then ends with people burying john Henry at the white house and watching the locomotives go remembering the legend that made it

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