The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #151198   Message #3526915
Posted By: JohnInKansas
15-Jun-13 - 11:47 PM
Thread Name: Looking for information on 'The Drunkards Boy'
Subject: RE: Origins: Looking for information on the song 'The
No recollection of ever having heard the song, but the lyric is in a style common during the US Prohibition campaign era. Campaign "song books" were a popular method of propagandizing, and many local and regional groups produced their own books.

This song doesn't appear in any of the three or four such songbooks I've come across, but a search on/in Temperance organizations might be a place to look. Unfortunately, there were lots of such groups and some of them were pretty much "local."

Should you happen to find the song, my observation is that the organizations were quite variable regarding a claim of copyright on the book as a whole, although they often gave a "composer name," many of whom seemed to be little old ladies of good intent but otherwise untraceable.

Vaguely similar songs appeared in a few "political party" songbooks in the era, but the "message" is a little stronger than I'd expect to see in one of those.

John