I sing a song called "Winnebago" by an acquaintance of mine named Ned Bachus, whom I've lost touch with. But I understand it's a parody of the aforementioned song.

Any clues? (I don't find it in the database.)

"My feet are on fire as I run. My name is Windigo"

I learned it as Windigo. I have a recording of Jim Post singing this song. An I'll try to post it for you unless Archival Art comes on and does it first.

Don

I am only speaking of my own experiences with the Indian culture, which is limited. Has anyone else noticed this?

One of my very best friends is a treaty Cree. She laughs at my confusion and childlike curiousity: White people are so young and have so much to learn. I think she's right. We do have so much to teach each other.

this site may be of interest: http://www.pantheon.org/mythica/areas/native_american/

Being vegetarian, I was sought out for this one~~~

Q: Where does the word 'vegetarian' come from?

A: It's Indian, meaning "poor hunter".

Happy day, y'all, Sheye

The family, a brave and his wife and their new baby securly tied to his cradle board, were walking through the trees and they decided to make their camp and eat. A fire was built, a fish caught and prepared. When they went to get the the baby they found all of the bindings broken and small footprints leading toward and into the lake. Where they emerged from the lake they seemed to be growing larger with almost every step. The ground under the footprints was cold and the leaves of grass were brittle and frozen solid. Thunder and lightning rolled through the sky and a huge lightning bolt cracked close to them. A short distance ahead a huge tree crashed to Earth. When they got to the place where the thing had fallen they found a shattered giant of solid ice in pieces all over the ground. In the middle of all the frozen debris, where the heart should've been, was their infant---dead. Then they realized the truth of it: Their baby had been a Windigo--one of that race of giant ice people/monsters.

Yes, Dwain Story wrote this song---in the early '60s. Every so often somebody takes to it, learns it and this modern song version of the many Windigo legends gets some new life. I think folks take to it for it's strangeness.

Dwain Story is a distant relative of Carl Story, an early bluegrass picker. He was a member of THE KNOBLICK UPPER TEN THOUSAND, a bluegrassy/folkie band of the 60s made up of Eric Jacobsom, Stu (Darsono) Ramsey, and Pete Childs. Dwain is quite ill now. I think I'll make some phone calls and check on him. Thanks to you all for reminding me that I've been negligent there.

Art Thieme

(Dwain Story, who wrote "Wendigo", is not doing well now. Too many years of chemical abuse in spite of the attempts of many to help him. To cure a headache, ya gotta take your aspirin--if you know what I mean.)

Art

THE PRIESTS OF THE GOLDEN BULL (Buffy Sainte-Marie)

Who brought the bomb wrapped up in buisness cards and stained with steak?
Who hires a maid to wash his money?
Who keeps politicians on the take?
Who puts outspoken third worlders in jail just to shut them down?
Oh the lies vary from place to place but the truth is still the same even in this town.

Money junkies all over the world trample us on their way to the bank
They run in every race
Windego.

Third worlders see it first
The dynamite, the dozers
the cancer and the acid rain
The corporate caterpillars come into our backyards
and turn the world to pocket change.

Reservations are the nuclear frontline
Uranium poisoning kills
We're starving in a handful of gluttons
We're drowning in their gravy spills.

Their tongues are silver forks
There's a lack of wisdom
you can hear it on their breath
Windego

It's delicate confronting these priests of the golden bull
They preach from the pulpit of the bottom line
Their minds rustle with million dollar bills.

They say silver burns a hole in your pocket
and gold burns a hole in your soul
Uranium burns a hole in forever
It just gets out of control.

There was a crooked man who walked a crooked mile
He raised a crooked sixpence to hide a crooked style
He won a crooked vote and he smiled a crooked smile
Windego.

Their tongues are silver forks
There's a lack of wisdom
you can hear it on their breath
Windego.

from the album "Coincidence And Likely Stories" (1992 Chrysalis/Ensign Records Canada)

rich r

Said the Cherokee queen, "Are you going my way?
Is that a roadmap I see clenched in your trembling hand,
A warrior brave made his ambush in a place where the moon made him blind,
We couldn't get word down the river in time,
And all we could hear in the night was the sound of him dying."

"Oh, my tall bronze man with the stars in his eyes,
There was a ruby in the forehead of my love.
The circle of our silence was broken,
Nobody could remember the plan,
The wise men cringed in the temple all night,
Waiting for word of the newcomers final demands."

"The ceiling fan turns so slowly in the night,
And the winner deals us another pack of lies,
Gambling again with the master,
I draw to the same pair of freaks,
Gambling again with disaster,"
And bleeding with whisky she dreams of her old Cherokee.

Said the Cherokee queen, "Are you going my way?
Is that a roadmap I see clutched in your trembling hand?
A warrior brave made his ambush
At a place where the moon made him blind,
We couldn't get word down the river in time,
And all we could hear in the night was the sound of him dying.
And bleeding with whisky she dreams of her old Cherokee.

Art Thieme

rr

Mooh.

exerpt from a childrens poem by Ruth Moore

I do think that you are thinking of the time my old uncle's cow got into the ink supply. It "mood indigo".

A more up to date take comes from Michigan filker Steve MacDonald; that one's called "Cold Butcher" and is on his JOURNEY'S DONE tape. Steve's page is http://www.smacdonald.com. He's gotten an award or two from the community for the song.

-- Gary

The legend is told among the Cree of a giant who wanders - Windigo Heart of ice and breath like fire, enemy to all things living And we in the age of technology have conquered the night but not the darkness In the core of the city a yellow eye opens, Windigo's coming, Windigo