DALLAS — Our first contact with extraterrestrials could come in the form of a little-known track by Blind Willie Johnson recorded in Deep Ellum in 1927.
Johnson was a guitarist and gospel and blues singer born in Brenham, Texas on January 22, 1897, according to the Texas State Historical Association.
“Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground,” is a 3:19 recording featuring haunting vocalizations without lyrics and a soulful acoustic guitar. Historians believe it was recorded for Columbia in Deep Ellum in 1927.
It’s among the recordings NASA included on the so-called “Golden Record,” which blasted off into outer space on the Voyager 1 in 1977.
The 12-inch, gold-plated record contains sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth, such as the songs of the humpback whales, a mother’s first words to her newborn baby, the brain waves of a woman who’d recently fallen in love and a collection of music.
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The record is encased in a protective aluminum jacket with a cartridge and needle, with symbolic instructions that explain the origin of the spacecraft and indicate how to play the record.
The golden record is meant to be a time capsule, “intended to communicate a story of our world to extraterrestrials,” according to NASA.
In 2017, the Voyager 1 became the first human creation to leave our solar system, stretching farther into the abyss every day.
If intelligent life were to discover it, and be able to play the record, they would get to know us, not our borders, not our differences, but the beautiful things we are capable of.
Among them the voice of Blind Willie Johnson, born in Texas…a date with destiny in the heavens.