Ella May Wiggins and The Mill Mother's Song by Patrick Huber. Patrick Huber is the author of Linthead Stomp, The Creation of Country Music in the Piedmont South. By far, the most famous balladeer to emerge out of the Gastonia Textile Strike of 1929 was Ella May Wiggins, a spinner at American Mill No. 1 in nearby Bessemer City and single mother of five whom the Communist press hailed as ...