Buna Hicks sang:

Now, my friends, the meeting is over,
Fathers, we must part.
And if I never see you anymore,
I'll love you in my heart.

We will land on shore,
We will land on shore.
We will land on shore,
And be safe forever more.

Other verses were sung for "mothers," "sisters," "brothers" and we often sang "neighbors" for the final verse. Yes, Caroline and I also recorded it on a record we made back in about 1965 or 1966 (I don't remember for sure and I'm too lazy to go look it up).

Jeff and Gerret Warner's father, Frank Warner, also recorded Buna Hicks back in about 1938, and then again, probably, in 1951. There may have been slight variations in her own singing of the hymn over the 23 years between Frank Warner's first visit to Beech Mountain and my much later one. By the way, this was not a Shaker hymn, to my knowledge, but was more likely an old Shape Note hymn quite widely sung in Appalachia. Buna told me that her mother was always asked to lead the song at the end of the camp meetings held in their area.

My Beech Mountain collection was first released on vinyl in the mid-1960s. It may not have made the charts, folks, but a lot of people learned good songs from it, people like the Armstrongs in Chicago, Geoff Kaufman, Jeff and Jeff, and "Cordelia's Dad," which is what it's all about, isn't it?

Sandy