IIRC, Frothingham's shanties are all taken from Stanton H. King's _Book of Chanties_ (Boston, 1918).

During WWI, the U.S. Merchant Marine Shipping Board Recruiting Service named King its "official chanty-man," though I believe it only meant that he led sailors in mass singing, a popular morale-builder of the day.

According to King's preface, "The chanties in this book are as I heard them sung, and have often sung them myself when a sailor on our deep water American sailing ships."

According to Who's Who in New England (1909), King was born in Barbados in 1867. He apparently went to sea in 1880, served six years in merchant ships and then six more as an enlisted man in the U.S. Navy. Who's Who lists him as a "sailors' missionary." He was Superintendent of the Sailors' Haven, Charlestown, Mass., for many years.

Carpenter recorded some material from King in the late '20s.