This weekend’s Farm Aid 2012 in Pennsylvania’s Hersheypark Stadium will be the 25th event staged to help America’s farmers (actually in 1989 they took Farm Aid on the road).
Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp, Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Dave Matthews and many more will play on Saturday, Sept. 22, 27 years to the day of the very first Farm Aid concert.
Farm Aid was inspired, of course, by Bob Dylan’s offhand comment at Live Aid in 1985 that he hoped some of the money would help American farmers in danger of losing their farms through mortgage debt. Nelson and Mellencamp took up the mantle and went to bat for U.S. farmers.
So, to celebrate Farm Aid, here’s Bob Dylan along with Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers and Willie Nelson, doing “Maggie’s Farm” at the 1985 event in Champaign, Illinois.