"Gonna Leave Ol' Texas" was the first song I ever had on an LP. But on that compilation of singers from Charlotte'e Web (a club in Rockdord, IL --1970s)called __GET FOLKED__, it was called "Wide Open Spaces" for some reason I never could figure out---noboidy bothered to ask me about it.My version came from Bob Gibson.

But from what Steinbeck said, the tune was "eerie" and "sung before the Spaniards came but the tune was Indian then."

Gordon Bok does the song in a minor key that could be called eerie, I guess. (see his Folk Legacy recordings---I think it's there on one o' those) Gibson's tune was almost happy and definitely in a major key. Not eerie at all.

And, somehow, I think Steinbeck MADE UP the part about it coming from "before the Spaniards came" and the song having an "Indian tune"! You ask me why I think that? Well, This is fiction, after all. Cattle were brought here first by the Spaniards. Before them, there weren't any. But we are talking about the tune more than the story of the song. More likely it's of Irish or British origin. This version I sing is from the latter days of the cattle drive era from Texas on the various trails. It's about CHANGE and THE END OF THINGS and just MOVIN' ON.
"The more things change, the more they get different."----Art

I'm gonna leave old Texas now,
They've got no place for the longhorn cow.

They've roped and fenced all over my range,
And the people there---they are so strange.

Gonna take my horse and away I'll go,
Find a better life in Mexico.

And so, kind friends, I bid adieu,
I'm a better man for just the knowin' of you.