Ten-year-old Bud, a motherless boy living in Flint, Miching, during the Great Depression, escapes a bad foster home and sets out in search of the man he believes to be his father, the renowned bandleader, H.E. Calloway of Grand Rapids.

John Henry is stronger than ten men, and can dig through a mountain faster than a steam drill. Lester's folksy retelling of a popular African-American folk ballad.