The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #7324   Message #44946
Posted By: Joe Offer
11-Nov-98 - 05:11 AM
Thread Name: Origins: Great American Bum
Subject: RE: Great American Bum
Annie, take a look at Folk Music - An Index to Recorded Resources (click me). Search under McClintock and Greenway and you'll see many of the songs they recorded. The verse you give about the rolling land seems to fit the tune of "Hallelujah, I'm a Bum," which has countless verses.
In Songs of Work and Protest, Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer say 'Harry McClintock, an old Wobbly songleader who recorded the song ("Hallelujah I'm a Bum") in 1926, has made a good case for his authorship. While hoboing on the open road in 1897 or 1898, bumming his meals for his supper, McClintock says he put new words to "Revive Us Again," and called it "Hallelulia on the Bum"'
The "Hallelujah on the Bum" song is in the Lingenfelter-Dwyer book called "Songs of the American West." Anybody got a copy of that book?-please check to see if the lyrics are different from what we have in the database.
-Joe Offer-