Thx all for responses...they covered the gamut pretty well. I was unaware of this native use of msdos, and there is something to be said for going at a problem in its native environment. The recursive form was what I was looking for:

C:\Users\Fred\Desktop>findstr /s Neskowin *.txt
handyman\template_stuff\captions\a.txt:I'm dragging my tools out again
+, getting them sharpened, adjusted for altitude. I can't help but not
+ice that your Neskowin property needs a lot of the type of TLC I arri
+ve with, beginning with oil for hinges.
[download]

Examples here: https://www.windows-commandline.com/findstr-command-examples-regular/

Cheers,