She was poor but she was honest,
no victim of a rich man's whim
till she met that southern gentleman, Big Jim Folsom
and she had a child by him.

Chorus:
   It's the rich what gets the glory;
   it's the poor what gets the blame;
   it's the same the whole world over, over, over;
   it's a dirty gosh darn shame.

Now he sits in Governor's Mansion
makin' laws for all mankind
while she walks the streets of Cullman, Alabama
selling grapes from her grapevine. (to chorus)

The moral of this story
is don't ever take a ride
with Alabama's Christian gentleman Big Jim Folsom
and you'll be a virgin bride. (to chorus)



I may have misremembered some of it but that's basically the way I sing it.

I liked Big Jim. He and his wife treated me well when I visited them at their home in Cullman. He telephone my grandmother (who was in Memphis, TN) while I was visiting. Jim and my grandmother (both of Elba, Alabama) were about the same age and he wanted to speak with his childhood friend, "Miss Liz," he called her. I think that was in the mid to late 1980's. She died in 1990 and he around the same time.

Is the song true? How would I know? My mother and great aunt loved to sing it when they were "feeling good."

Steve Sedberry