Seeger returned to New York around 1940, then traveled west with Woody Guthrie, performing at union rallies and concerts, hitchhiking and hopping freight trains. He founded the Almanac Singers with Millard Lampell and Lee Hays, along with Guthrie, who joined later.
In 1949, Pete, Toshi, their son, Daniel, and two daughters, Mika and Tinya, moved to their 17-acre plot in Beacon, living in a tent while they built their log-cabin house. Around the same time, Pete, Lee Hays, Ronnie Gilbert and Fred Hellerman began singing together as the Weavers.