Hi, Larry - these are the words we have for "Old Zeb," as submitted by Dennis Cook to the Digital Tradition many years ago. Do you have any stories to tell us about the song? Any corrections to the lyrics? Please be sure to tell us how to get permission to use this song on recordings, etc.
-Joe-

OLD ZEB (from Digital Tradition)
(Larry Kaplan)

I'm not tired of the wind, I'm not weary of the sea,
But she's prob'ly had a bellyfull of a damned old coot like me.
I'm bound a-shore, she's gone for better days,
But I'll see her topsail flyin' when I come down off the way.

Chorus:

Rosie, get my Sunday shoes,
Gertie get my walkin' cane;
We'll take another walk to see
Old Alice sail again.

Wish I had a nickel for the men I used to know
Who could load three cords of lumber in half an hour or so.
Who could put sail be hauling, 'stead of donkeyin' around.
Then I' d be the poorest coasterman this side of Edgartown.

Any fool can run an engine, it takes brains to work a sail,
I've never seen no steamer make much good out of a gale.
You can go and pay your taxes on the rationed gas you get;
But at least to me, the wind is free, and they haven't run out yet.

If I ever get back to her, you know I'd treat her just the same:
Drive her when I want to, I'd sail in freezing rain.
Park old Alice on the beach, and go dancin' in the town,
Cause a man who's fit for hangin' prob'ly never will get drowned.

Learned from Bob Walser, Indian Neck, 1984
(who got it from Bruce Thompson)

The song concerns Capt. Zebulon Tilton, who skippered the
schooner Alice B. Wentworth out of Vinyard Haven. He retired at
age 83; Rosie and Gertie were his daughters. The song appears on
"Cap'n Hawkins' Choice" ( Winter Haven Records).

Copyright Larry Kaplan
@sailor @aging
filename[ OLDZEB
DC

---

Notes that Larry posted on the YouTube entry:

Mildred Tilton Huntington first told me about the life and times of her great uncle, Zebulon Northrup Tilton in 1975, but I had known about this coasterman from Massachusetts a number of years before. Zeb was born in 1867, and died in 1952 at the age of eighty-five. He lived long enough to see the coasting schooner trade all but disappear. I wrote this song about the day Zeb's daughters, Rosie and Gertie, helped him ashore, leaving his favorite vessel, the 'Alice S. Wentworth,' for the last time. You can learn more about Zeb from Polly Burrough's book, "Zeb," and from the singing of many fine musicians and friends helped me share this song.---PS...Zeb always called her 'The Wentworth' and was every bit the kind of character the song tries to portray!

(adapted from the liner notes of "Worth All The Telling" Folk Legacy Records, Inc., copyright, 1993)