OK, a few notes on What It's All the @#$% About:

Essentially, it's an Almanac, like most almanacs but exclusively to do with Folkishness. Like "Today in History of Folklore/song/music." That's all there is to it.

It began with someone saying Wouldn't it be great if we (ie, rec.music.folk) could come up with a song for each day of the year. Especially if the song specifically mentions the day. Eg, "On St Patrick's Day, the seventeenth, from New York we set sail." But, he went on, Obviously, that's impossible. Well the Happy File (which is what the master file is called) has pretty much that and an average of seven items per day.

Happy! is anything you (or rather I) can possibly say to someone "Happy xxx!" about. Like Happy Earth Day! Or Happy Queen's Birthday! Something official and begun by someone else. If Joe's Coupon Offers Company decides unilaterally to declare National Coupon Day, I disregard it. Has to come from some (more or less) official body.

I can always wish you a Happy Birthday, though. Eg, today is Mohammed's birthday BUT I can't really wish you a Happy Mohammed's Birthday! because I don't know an appropriate folk song about him. It's Today in Folk stuff, not any old thing. Thousands of things happened on any given day of the year but we don't care unless they are folkish things.

happy? is anything else folkish that happened on this day. Maybe sad, maybe quirky, maybe euphoric. The question mark simply means I'm not so sure this is something to be happy about.

There are many hard and fast rules to how things are used to which I pay exact attention. Usually. For example, truths within songs take precedence over "historical fact." I have learned that historical fact ain't nearly always as accurate as historians would have us believe but folklore is always folklore.

Most printed Almanacs & Books of Days are deeply derivative and many errors are just passed from one to the next. About the best is Chase's Annual Events which often disagrees with accepted history but is more likely to be right about these things. There are many Almanacs out there - Music History, American Indian, Scottish Timeline, Jewish, many including mostly unattributed copies of the Today program which was, I believe, first organized by Patrick Kincaid in the 70's. I know of no extensive Today in Folk besides the Happy File. The marvelous Sam Hinton did something similar for schools and has taken a long life long scholar's interest in the history behind folk song. I have stolen from him extensively. Doug Henkle has done extensive great stuff on dates and Ray Lawless on superb brief bios through the 60's. Many of these are not attributed here but if you ever see a birthday formatted 00-00-0000 instead of 00/00/0000 then you know I got it from Henkle. I've used heavily many excellent folk fact collections, Bill Markwick's Folk File, Bob Waltz, et all's Ballad Index (Version 2.0 now released), Manfred Helfert's fine History In Song and obviously, I couldn't even have started without the Digital Tradition. Thanks Dick.

I am not a scholar. I am not a(n) historian. I have swiped many items from other less-than-perfect sources which, in turn, were swiped from previous questionable sources. My later entries tend to be better-attributed. Really, I've done actual primary research on less than 10% so be careful with your bar bets. (Another rule is that I am not responsible for your losses but get half your winnings.) On the other hand, there are no frivolous, made-up facts, either. I've done my best to review and verify from available sources. I never cheat, changing a fact or date so it will fit into a day for which I really need another entry. I might use, eg, Greenland Whale Fisheries on several dates but that's because "We sailed" on many different dates in different collections. I don't do that much, though.

Sometimes the connection of a song to a particular date is just a leeeetle tenuous. But it's always a legitimate connection.

Importantly, like any such collection, there must be numerous errors and typos. I'll much appreciate any serious corrections and incorporate them in the main file. If my entry to Mudcat is stupid enough, I'll get that changed, too. As to your dumb opinions, well, you're certainly entitled to them aren't you?

There are no sacred cows here. Not you, not me, not even Queen Elizabeth I of the United Kingdom. I expect some people will be offended by some of the Happy posts. Hmmm.

At one time, it was common at rec.music.folk for fans to post brief bios of their favorite artists on the birthday or to otherwise commemorate birthdays or memorials. To some extent, my posts from the Happy file may have intimidated posters and made them less likely to post. I certainly hope that doesn't happen here. I might overlook your favorite for many reasons - including that I might not know about it. I assure one and all that I have no copyright on the word 'happy' nor do I control what any others post. (I can barely control myself.)

It's a while since I last posted Happys on any regular basis. At that time I was deeply honored by this post:

        On the fifteenth day of April,
                In Nineteen-ninety-eight,
        We saw, here in our Newsgroup,
                The final "Happy" date.
        But there's a ray of sunshine
                That falls upon my brow,
        For Abby's words are soothing--
                He says "...at least for now."
(To be sung to the tune of Woody Guthrie's "Dust Storm Disaster.")

                  Sam Hinton, La Jolla, CA

I'm baaack!