coffee stirred by thumb:Tales of the Frozen Logger

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Deckman
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 11:24 AM

Yippe! I just found two VERY OBSCURE verses for "Frozen Logger." I found these in the late Walt Robertson song notes. I can remember him telling me that he thought Jim Stevens wrote them, but rarely sang them.

"They found him in the morning, A cold, sad frozen ghost, They took him to a stable, To make a hitching post."

"Someday a hot house will thaw him, And home to me he'll come, And I'll sit and proudly watch him, Stir his coffee with his thumb." CHEERS, Bob Nelson (deckman)

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 03:14 PM

I have heard those two verses someplace -- I think it was from Stan James about twenty-odd years ago, but I think the words are "hot horse." The stable and all that. . . .

Thanks. I've wanted to get hold of them and wondered where Stan got them.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Deckman
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 09:12 PM

You're right Don, it is "HOT HORSE" Between Walt's scribble, and my old eyes ... oh well, you understand!

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: GUEST,winterbright
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 04:27 PM

Oh, please, please, please... SOMEBODY send the "Frozen Jogger" lyrics before I have to write some of my own!!! This is too good to ignore!

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 05:16 PM

Sorry I've been out of the loop on this one. I sang with Walt Robertson back in the dark ages in Seattle. Met him just after he got back from his hitch in the Army. He got himself a beautiful Pietro Carbone 12-string guitar while he was in New York. I remember him telling about Pietro making him sing while playing it, just to be sure he had enough voice to sing over it, before he'd agree to sell it to him. Then he crossed the country on his motorcycle with that precious instrument slung across his back!

I was living in a houseboat on Portage Bay and we had some fine song swaps there. I learned "Acres of Clams," "The Housewife's Lament," "My Old Man was a Man Like Lincoln," and many other songs from Walt. For me, he was a real goldmine and a cherished friend.

When I decided to leave Seattle, he volunteered to sing at the auction/party we threw to help raise money for my trip to New York. Another friend acted as auctioneer, and we sold all of my paintings to friends who gatheered for the great send-off. Walt must have done three sets for us that night. I guess this was just before he began doing his 15-minute folksong program on KING-TV, because I heard about it, but never saw it.

Some twenty years later, Walt came through here and stayed with us at Folk-Legacy. Caroline and I were doing a gig at the Sounding Board and took Walt along as our guest artist. He had been working as a newspaper editor (was it in Vancouver, Washington?), and had not been doing much music in the interim. Mostly he was doing the good old songs we had shared in Seattle, plus a couple of his own creation.

I was very sorry I couldn't make it to Seattle for the "celebration of his life" after he died. He played a very important part in my growing interest in folksong at a critical point in my life. Probably had more to do with the direction my life finally took that I recognized at the time. I sure am glad that Bob has his song notes, and that I now know who "deckman" is!

By the way, James Stevens also wrote some pretty good "proletarian" novels. I've just picked up a copy of Big Jim Turner, partly because one chapter describes his meeting with Joe Hill. Haven't read it all yet, but... so many other things to be done!

Sandy (remembering the good old days)

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Deckman
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 05:46 PM

Hi Sandy ... I'm SURE this is very BAD FORM, but I'm new enough to computers that I don't know how to e-mail back to you. I suppose I can push a magic button, or kick this machine three times, and your address will pop up. Anyway, MY e-mail is [e-mail]. I'd like to chat with you very much. CHEERS to all, Bob Nelson

Subject: Lyr Add: FROZEN LOGGER^^^
From: StillyRiverSage (inactive)
Date: 08 Jan 01 - 12:17 AM

FROZEN LOGGER^^^
(James Stevens)

As I sat down one evening,
'Twas in a small cafe,
A forty-year old waitress, (or "six-foot seven waitress")
To me these words did say:

I see you are a logger
And not just a common bum,
For no one but a logger
Stirs his coffee with his thumb.

I had a logger lover,
There's none like him today,
If you'd pour whiskey on it
He'd eat a bale of hay.

He never shaved a whisker
From off of this horny hide,
He hammered in the bristles
And bit 'em off inside.

My logger came to see me,
Twas on a winter day,
He held me in a fond embrace
That broke three vertebrae.

He kissed me when he left me
So hard that he broke my jaw;
I could not speak to tell him
He'd forgot his mackinaw.

I saw my logger lover
Go sauntering through the snow,
A whistling gaily homeward
At forty-eight below.

The weather tried to freeze him,
It tried its level best;
At a hundred degrees below zero
He buttoned up his vest.

It froze clear through to China,
It froze to the stars above,
At a thousand degrees below zero,
It froze my logger love.

They tried in vain to thaw him,
And would you believe it sir,
They made him into axe blades
To chop the Douglas fir.

That's how I lost my logger,
And it's to this cafe I've come,
And here I wait for someone,
To stir his coffee with his thumb.

This is off the top of my head, many years since I last was anyplace to sing it. I'm sure folks can offer a few corrections or a forgotten verse or two.

Maggie

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: StillyRiverSage (inactive)
Date: 08 Jan 01 - 12:22 AM

Well, Darn. How does one get the lines to format properly? I set the Frozen Logger in the proper stanzas and they all ran together. Do I have to use a soft return or HTML in this format?

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Deckman
Date: 08 Jan 01 - 01:21 AM

What a memory Maggie, you got it just right. CHEERS

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 08 Jan 01 - 01:40 AM

It's those doggoned little HTML breaks that are necessary, Maggie, and we all mess 'em up regularly. Joe or one of his Clones can come along later and repair our goofs, thank heaven!

Bob: You can reach me (direct) at [e-mail], or you can go to the top of the page and click on Personal Pages and scroll down to the "send a personal message" line. Tell the infernal device you want to send one to Sandy Paton, kickstart it once, gently, and Bingo!, you can write to me that way. I'll watch for your E-pistle.

Sandy

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Bert
Date: 09 Jan 01 - 06:58 PM

refresh - thread of the week

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: GUEST,winterbright
Date: 10 Jan 01 - 03:01 PM

Is this Frozen JOGGER thing just a myth, or what? I can't believe NOBODY out there knows (or has the time or energy) to type 'em out. Sigh.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Don Firth
Date: 10 Jan 01 - 05:08 PM

I never learned The Frozen Jogger myself, but I've definitely heard it, from John Dwyer and from others. It's not a myth.

Have patience, Winterbright. Just remember, in a world in which large numbers of folksingers are so (relatively) young that not only have they never heard The Frozen Logger (recorded by all sorts of people, including The Weavers), but they have never even heard of it, most of us who do remember the song are old geezers with Geritol stains all over our lap robes.

We're workin' on it. It just takes us a little longer to remember, that's all.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Peter T.
Date: 10 Jan 01 - 05:19 PM

bert is right, what a great thread. yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: simon-pierre
Date: 10 Jan 01 - 07:34 PM

Don, don't be too severe with your age. I am "relatively young" (24), and I am very glad that others people share their knowledge here. I never heard the song, or heard of, before. Since I read this thread, I heard it twice this week, by the Weavers and by Bert (?) at the Mudcat Radio. Now I know a little bit about Jim Stevens, Ivar Haglund, John Dwyer, reel to reel tapes and the folk scene in Seattle... Experience and knowledge are like folk music, they need to be told and shared. Thanks you.

SP

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: MMario
Date: 11 Jan 01 - 11:33 AM

frozen jogger has been published - there is suppossed to be a link here but I don't know as it is blocked.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Deckman
Date: 11 Jan 01 - 10:42 PM

Let's keep this one going ... it's getting interesting!

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: GUEST,winterbright
Date: 12 Jan 01 - 10:49 AM

So Don, does this knowledge of "Logger" make me a geezeress?... geezerette? Actually, I might prefer Crone-in-Training, but either of the preceeding are fine... no problem. MMario, I went to the link you so kindly provided and will check it out in detail when I'm not rushing back to my job. Thanks for the help. In the meantime, if anybody comes up with "Jogger" lyrics (especially before Sat. night) I'd shore 'preciate it!

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: StillyRiverSage (inactive)
Date: 15 Jan 01 - 01:01 AM

Don,

Is Frozen Jogger the one with the "broken token" of a garbage bag twist tie? Or a piece of lace used in its place? Or am I thinking of something else? There were also lots of "Raggle Taggle Gypsy" parodies and I might be conflating the parodies.

Maggie

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Alice
Date: 15 Jan 01 - 11:18 AM

I just want to say I love this thread... The Frozen Logger songs has always intrigued me. Thanks to all who provided more information about it.

Alice Flynn

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 15 Jan 01 - 12:44 PM

Didn't Anne Hills, Priscilla Herdman & Cindy Mangsen record "The Frozen Logger" on one of their recent (maybe released last year) CDs? I'm pretty sure I heard it played on a local folk radio show, but I don't have the CD, so I can't be sure. Who's got a copy?

Sandy

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: GUEST,Art Brooks
Date: 15 Jan 01 - 06:02 PM

The (Seattle) song circle we belonged to in the mid-70s added this at the end: You may not believe this story, but I know it for a fact And standing there behind the door is a frozen flannel ax.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 24 May 03 - 10:35 AM

I'm trying to remember a parody of this song. It's about a biker, and starts.

As I sat down one evening, twas in a small cafe
A forty year old waitress these words to me did say
I see that you're a biker, my brother was one of those
Cos only a biker has a bug spot on his nose.

It then goes on about the fabulous bike he built and then rode, it went something like...
He took off down the highway, he took off like a bird
He was doing 180 when he shifted into third.

Ring any bells?
Giok

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: GUEST,Marj
Date: 28 Jan 04 - 09:19 PM

I just LOVE this song. I've only heard Oscar Brand do it, and he sings a different last 2 verses:

They found him in the mornin'
A poor, sad, frozen ghost
And they set him up in a stable
As a horse's hitching post.

Some day some hot horse will thaw him,
And back to me he'll come
And I'll sit and I'll proudly watch him
Stirring coffee with his thumb!

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Jan 04 - 09:31 PM

Ohhh- me in my former life! I lost my original Mudcat password and such and set up this Stilly River Sage account. Someone fixed it so I'm only on this account now. (Fessing up, since several folks have been going through name changes lately here, like Mike, er, can't remember that last name--Rapaire, and others).

Looks like it's Old Home Week at Mudcat. Several Pacific Northwest threads revived. I do need to track down those words to the "Frozen Jogger." I heard Dad sing that one frequently, so the words are no doubt in one of these boxes around here.

SRS

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb
From: EBarnacle
Date: 29 Jan 04 - 10:27 AM

A recent parody can be found on the Steadfast Sailor thread.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: bbc
Date: 11 Feb 04 - 09:43 AM

Sandy,

I don't know about the trio recording the song, but I have it on Cindy Mangsen & Steve Gillette's Live in Concert recording from 1991. Fun song!

best always,

Barbara

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 11 Feb 04 - 03:06 PM

Funny -- just before checking in to Mudcat I was listening to Priscilla Herdman, Anne Hills & Cindy Mangsen's recording of "Frozen Logger" and "Proper Cup of Coffee" on "Voices of Winter" CD.

Linn

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: BK Lick
Date: 11 Feb 04 - 06:02 PM

Ah, ain't it sweet how these old threads never die; they just fade away until someone comes along after a few years and revives them again.

Yes, Sandy—Herdman, Hills, and Mangsen recorded it on their 1997 Gadfly album, Voices of Winter as a medley with Proper Cup of Coffee.

Here in Chicago, in the bleak midwinter, this CD occupies a permanent slot in our changer. It helps us pull through.

          — BK

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Buzzer65
Date: 04 Nov 05 - 03:57 PM

Yes! Thank God they never die!!! I found this on a download engine sung by Cisco Houston...A great song..I am looking for some tabs to go with it...I'm a 68 year old learner and I want this in my collection...Anybody help?

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Stewart
Date: 04 Nov 05 - 05:40 PM

You can get this song - The Frozen Logger - and a parody - The Frozen Jogger - on my CD - Songs of the Pacific Northwest.

Cheers, S in Seattle

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Amos
Date: 04 Nov 05 - 05:44 PM

Buzzer -- the chords are very direct - 1, 4 and 5.


A

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 02:13 AM

Apparently I missed this thread when it was newer. It might be of interest to note that the "Logger" appears in at least 5 books in my collection, although all of them are "popular versions" with little information on origins.

Variously shown under the titles " The Frozen Logger," "The Frozen Lover," or "The Logger Lover:"

Rise Up Singing, Ed Peter Blood & Annie Patterson, Sing Out Publication, ISBN 0-9626704-7-2, I believe this is lyrics only.

The Incomplete Folksinger, Pete Seeger, Univ of Nebraska Press, 1992, ISBN 0-8032-9216-3, lyrics only, may be an incomplete fragment.

Folk Songs Of North America, Alan Lomax, Doubleday & Co., Inc, NY 1960, Melody, Chords, 11 verses.

The New Song Fest: 300 Songs, Intercollegiate Outing Club Association. (©1960 I believe, but my copy has a few pages missing). Out of print so far as I know, but copies occasionally seen.

Songs For Swingin' Housemothers, F. Lynn, Chandler, 1961. Out of print, and a little rarer than the IOCA book, but worth looking for. There are several editions, but so far as I've heard it hasn't been published since about 1963.(?)

From Sea to Shining Sea (A Treasury of American Folklore and Folk Songs) , compiled by and ©Amy L. Cohn, Scholastic Publishing 1993, ISBN 0-590-42868-3.

The last one is the only one my index indicates has more than single staff notation (melody line). It shows "simplified piano." It is a fairly recent compilation, and I believe I got it off a Barnes or Borders "sale" table. Since a lot of what shows up at either place as sale items is printed specifically for the sale table, it may still be in print.

I don't find anything in my collection on "The Frozen Jogger," which I'm sure I've seen, and I'm pretty sure I've also seen another parody called "The Frozen Climber" – for which I also can find no trace at all. (I found that the Song Fest book has "the other classic mountaineer club parody" – "Gory, Gory, Hallelujah" but apparently not the "Frozen Climber".)

John

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Ep' Eric
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 07:42 AM

I Have been singing this song, with guitar accompaniment, for many
years at Ep'th folk club in England . I think I got
it from the Burle Ives songbook. Also the previously mentioned
Devil and Farmer's Wife.

I understood his Mackinaw, to be his top coat that kept the cold out,
as if it mattered.

                                        Eric
                                        Epworth.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: kendall
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 07:52 AM

Considering that it was a Scot who invented the raincoat, it was probably named a "MacIntosh", whereas the Mackinaw is a heavy outer coat made for warmth, not rain.

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Tannywheeler
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 09:52 AM

Yeah, but:
1)MacIntosh doesn't rhyme with jaw; and/or,
2)"Mackinaw" is the pronounciation of an island in one of the Great Lakes in a logging area (of either Canada or U.S.), which has SERIOUS winter, and therefore would need heavy-duty outerwear which might be named for the location.????? Maybe????
And I sang this for an old friend, the bar manager at the cafe (that hosted great song/instrumental sessions for years) on her 40th b'day. She loved it--like everyone else in the room.    Tw

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Mark Ross
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 11:49 AM

A Mackinaw is a heavy wool coat worn by loggers.

Mark Ross

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 01:10 PM

Mackinaws

CAPOTES & WOOL CLOTHING appears to claim to make "authentic period clothing" of various kinds. The "authenticity" is unknown, but the various designs shown illustrate the "trad lore" that outer coats commonly were made from blankets and/or "blanket cloth." A "Mackinaw" is about half way down the page.

Tradition appears to say that the Mackinaw coat is/was named for "Old Mackinac" which was a fort in Michigan, at or near the the present town of Mackinaw. Several online dictionaries cite, pretty much identically:

"ETYMOLOGY: After Old Mackinac, a fort on the site of present-day Mackinaw City in northern Michigan. "

Note that the common pronunciation of both "Mackinac" and "Mackinaw" places the accent/emphasis on the first syllable. A bit of historical research might find a MacKinac associated with the fort, but none of the easily found web info makes any comment, so about all that can be safely concluded is that it looks/sounds like it might have a Scots origin or lineage. Nothing found thus far indicates a time or even an era for the establishment of the fort.

Yukon/klondike gold rush stampeder's supply list, 1898 identified as the list provided by the Northern Pacific Railroad, includes "one Mackinaw coat." Reliability of this site is unknown. I'd dig a little deeper if it really mattered before citing this as an "authentic historical document," but tradition generally supports the use of the "Mackinaw" coat identification at and/or well prior to this era.

The "style" of the Mackinaw, as it's known in the US is a heavy coat made usually of close-woven wool cloth resembling a thick (i.e. old-fashioned) blanket material, about "butt-length" and presumed to be shortened to provide greater freedom of movement than other styles.

The quick look via Google, taking just the surface scum, provides no particular support not clearly hearsay that this style was particularly favored by lumberjacks, even though that is "oral tradition." Photographs from the turn of the century of lumberjack camps show a few coats of this (short) style, but longer styles are much more prevalent.

It appears to have been common practice to make outer garments from blankets, and some blankets were plaid; but there is little support for the notion that "plaid" was an essential part of the early usage for the "Mackinaw" coat. It's about as likely that the nearly universal use of plaid material was a later marketing ploy – "It sound's sort of Scot, so it should be plaid."

Military Mackinaw (Jeep Coat) in World War II shows the US Army version(s). In typical military fashion, the most frequently commented "feature" of this coat was that although it was intended for "Jeep drivers" the tail was not quite long enough to actually sit on, and was an uncomfortable lump when it crawled up behind one's butt.

I don't know to what extent the military usage popularized the Mackinaw name, but immediately post-WWII the Mackinaw (commercial retail version) was one of the most popular jacket styles for kids. Boys who were in grade school in the mid to late 1940s, especially in small/rural schools where sophisticated heating was less common, probably remember the "lumpy butt syndrome" quite well. In that time period, the retail products were invariably plaid, and other names were used for the same "cut" if another material was used.

John

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 01:18 PM

One of the first songs I learned back in the mists of antiquity.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Deckman
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 02:44 PM

Don ... You learned this soooo long ago you still had your Swedish accent ... or did you learn it in Ballard! CHEERS, Bob(deckman)Nelson

Subject: RE: coffee stirred by thumb - Frozen Logger
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Nov 05 - 03:01 PM

Actually, the first time I ever heard the song was before I got involved in folk music. It was back about 1949 or so at the party after the Pacific International Fencing Tournament in Vancouver, B. C. where they presented the trophies and medals and then we all went to work replacing the bodily fluids we had sweated out over the weekend. Dan Drumheller, one of the Spokane fencers (and one helluva swordsman!), when sufficiently loosened up by the free-flowing beverages provided by our host, lifted his voice in song and gave out with two ditties:   The Frozen Logger and When the Iceworms Nest Again. Didn't play the guitar as far as I know, but he was quite a good singer.

Which reminds me. I've always been going to learn Iceworms, but never did. Well, better late than never.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: Genie
Date: 18 Mar 06 - 10:01 PM

I posted this in the Mangled Lyrics thread -- where you use an internet "translation" program and translate first from English to German, then from German to French, and finally from French back to English -- but this particular song "circular translation" was way to funny to leave buried there, so here is The Frozen Logger, BabelFish style: ;-D

THE CRANE OF BLOCK FROZEN

Like me one evening in the small coffee hinsass,
has the forty waitresses of year of to me that these words said:
"I sees that you are a crane of block, and not precisely ordinary Gammler,
because nobody, a crane of block agitates however his coffee is an inch.

My liked was a crane of block. There is none today of it but him.
If you pour Whisky on him, it would eat a package hay.

It never shaved its Whiskers by far its skin hornigen.
It would bite it far towards the interior inside with a hammer zerstossen and it right.

My liked came to see one day of winter me afterwards.
It held covered me in a vernarrtem which broke three movements.

It embraced me, distributed us, therefore strongly it in my Kiefer fallows some;
I could not speak, to declare to him that it forgot its mackinaw.

Then, sauntering I saw wanting to say liked to leave and by snow
and joyeusement heimwaerts went to the bottom forty-eight.

Time tried to freeze time him; it tested its level well.
With degrees hundred below zero, it buttoned its waistcoat.

It has cold it towards China, has clearly cold in top with stars.
It has cold my love of crane of block to miles degrees above below zero.

In futile, you would thaw out it and tried to believe you him, Sir?
He in the axtblaetter, the Douglas ones precisely left you with Spot cuts.

And thus, I lost want to say liked, and I came to this coffee,
and here I, wait somebody agitates his coffee with his inch."

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 18 Mar 06 - 11:19 PM

"agitates his coffee with his inch"



....... !!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 12:41 AM

We were playing that game a while back here a Mudcat, multiple translations of a text (probably over at MOAB)--it can be quite a revelation as to the work language is doing!

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 06:49 AM

Try 'Mangled Lyrics' Thread.

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: Leadfingers
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 06:59 AM

Frozen logger AND New Pipes ??

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: Deckman
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 10:34 AM

Jim Stevens told me in 1959 that the first verse, as was populiarly known then, is INCORRECT. He said that he wrote: "A SIX FOOT SEVEN WAITRESS ...: Bob(deckman)Nelson

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: Big Jim from Jackson
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 10:36 AM

Somewhere I heard a last verse that had something about they turned him into axe-heads to cut the northern pine. Or words to that effect.

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 10:47 AM

Nope. He's a Northwestern hero--it's Douglas fir. Anything else is someone's adaptation of the original!

Subject: RE: frozen logger
From: open mike
Date: 19 Mar 06 - 10:48 AM

wow-the only thing that didn't get mangled was the mackinaw...
isn't a mangle an iron that presses garments??