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On September 19, at his home in Chevy Chase, Joe Glazer, the troubadour of the U.S. labor movement, passed away.

He will be fondly remembered his collected songs of work and protest which he composed and performed for 60 years at countless union rallies, conventions and marches around the globe.

Mr. Glazer, the son of Jewish immigrants, grew up on Manhattan's Lower East Side and during the 1940s. He developed a love for cowboy music, which inspired him to order a $5 guitar from a Sears catalog and learn to play and sing.

Joe was the first of his family to finish college when he graduated from Brooklyn College, and he used his ability to sing and play to help land a job with the Textile Workers Union of America.

After working for the Textile Workers and the United Rubber Workers, Mr. Glazer joined the Foreign Service staff of the USIA in 1961, then headed by Edward R. Murrow, and was sent to Mexico as labor information officer. He transferred to the State Department in Washington as a labor adviser in 1965.

With a booming baritone voice and his thumping guitar, his rousing songs lit up halls and arenas for crowds of thousands, gatherings of friends or for Democratic Party candidates.

He recorded more than 30 albums and became a leading collector, publisher and historian of labor and protest songs, helping establish the Labor Heritage Foundation in Washington. Many of his songs have  become labor classics including: "We Shall Overcome," "Automation," "The Mill Was Made of Marble