In the thread May I Have This Dance, my friend padre asked if I would post the lyrics to this song. I looked to see if it had already been posted and didn't find it (but then I am a little clumsy, finding things,) so I'll post it here. If I'm duplicating something... hey, I'm getting ollllllldddddd.

Just a little background on the song. During the 1940's an enterprising man took a flat topped boat used for moving houses on the river, built benches and posts with Japanese lanterns strung around the sides of the platform and created a dance floor. He painted it silver, bought a juke box and the latest records and named the boat The Silver Queen. This was during the height of the second World War, and when my Mother, my sisters and I walked down to the river to ride on the boat, there were always a few men home on leave, enjoying a slow dance with the local girls before heading back on duty. I was 6 or 7 years old then, and would get a good spot on one of the benches near the juke box and sit there with my 7up and a bag of OkeeDokie cheese covered popcorn and watch the dancers.

This song came to me, many years later. My friend Roy Harris recorded this song and it came out sounding like an English dance hall song.

Riding up the river, on the good ship Silver Queen
Dancing on the water for a dime
There's a young girl and a soldier, who's just come home on leave
And he asks her for a dance, just one last time

Chorus:

   And the music softly floats across the water
   And the lights are dim and distant on the shore
   And though those times are long since gone, they're not forgotten
   But they'll go riding on the Silver Queen no more

Each day she'd write a letter, remembering that night
Until the day he answered her no more
Now in a front room window, there hangs a faded star
And the Silver Queen lies empty on the shore

The reference to the faded star is for the flags that were hung in windows to indicate that a family member was wounded, or killed in battle. Many years after the war, the flags still hung in many front room windows I passed, walking to school.

Jerry