Origins: Dallas Gawn A Cuba

Subject: Origins: Dallas Gawn A Cuba
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 02 Aug 11 - 06:31 PM

DALLAS GAWN A CUBA
(from "Mango Time: Folk Songs of Jamaica" Collected by Noel Dexter and Godfrey Taylor, published 2007)

DALLAS GAWN A CUBA

1. Dallas gawn a Cuba,
Dallas gawn a Cuba,
Dallas gawn a Cuba, lef Francella wan fi wanda.

(Chorus)
Maamie, wai oh! She faint 'way!
Sen' fi di docta! She faint 'way!
Run fi di camphor! She faint 'way!
Maamie, wai oh! She faint 'way!

2. Po' Miss Mary daata,
Po" Miss Mary daata,
Po' Miss Mary daata,
Po' Francella lef fi wanda.

(Chorus)

3. Johnnie roun' di corner,
Johnnie roun' di corner,
Johnnie roun' di corner,
Him naa lef yu wan fi wanda.

(Chorus)

What is the significance of Dallas going to Cuba? Why would a young Jamaican man choose to go to Cuba in the 19th century? (I assume this is a 19th century/Victorian song, because of the camphor reference- in "Little Women" Jo sees Beth with a "comphor-bottle in her hand" just before Beth gets sick with scarlet fever).

Subject: RE: Origins: Dallas Gawn A Cuba
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 02 Aug 11 - 09:40 PM

The exact same lyrics were published with musical score in Tom Murray, 1951, Folk Songs of Jamaica, Oxford University Press. It was sung by Edric Connor and the Caribbeans in 1952 (reissue, on cd, Folk Songs of Jamaica).
Camphor is a common ingredient of 'smelling salts', used into the 1920s, after which women supposedly were not so squeamish and less prone to fainting. The mention of camphor in the song thus has no exclusively 19th century meaning.

Cuba, with its hotels and casinos pre-Castro revolution, was a source of jobs.

Subject: RE: Origins: Dallas Gawn A Cuba
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 03 Aug 11 - 02:07 AM

Thanks, Q. So I guess the implication is that he would have gone to Cuba (near to Jamaica)to get a job and return with money (apparently common to Afro-Caribbean workers even in the 21st century), that's according to stuff I read.