The Swanee River
(Old
Folks at Home)
Written by
Stephen C. Foster
Way
down upon de Swanee Ribber,
Far, far away,
Dere's wha my heart is turning
ebber,
Dere's wha de old folks stay.
All up and down de whole
creation
Sadly I roam,
Still longing for de old
plantation,
And for de old folks at home.
Chorus
All
de world am sad and dreary,
Eb-rywhere I roam;
Oh, darkeys, how my heart grows
weary,
Far from de old folks at home!
2nd
verse
All
round de little farm I wandered
When I was young,
Den many happy days I
squandered,
Many de songs I sung.
When I was playing wid my
brudder
Happy was I;
Oh, take me to my kind old
mudder!
Dere let me live and die.
3rd
Verse
One
little hut among de bushes,
One dat I love
Still sadly to my memory rushes,
No matter where I rove.
When will I see de bees
a-humming
All round de comb?
When will I hear de banjo
strumming,
Down in my good old home?
Stephen C. Foster, one of
America's Best-loved musical
storytellers, wrote "The Swanee
River (Old Folks at Home)" in 1851.
A memorial center at White Springs
honors Foster, who authored about
200 songs during his prolific
career.
The Suwannee River flows southerly
from the Okeefenokee Swamp in
Georgia to the Gulf of Mexico in
Florida, topographically slicing the
Florida panhandle from the rest of
the state.
After Foster wrote "The Swanee
River" in 1851, he sold it to famed
minstrelman E. P. Christy. Foster is
reported to have chosen the "Swanee"
because its two-syllable cadence fit
nicely into the music he had
composed. It could not have been due
to a familiarity with the river's
Florida section, since Foster never
visited the state.
Through House Concurrent Resolution
No. 22 in 1935, S. P. Robineau of
Miami successfully entered "The
Swanee River" as the official state
song, replacing "Florida, My
Florida," which had been adopted as
the State Song in 1913. By 1935
Foster's rightful position as a
writer and composer had been
established.
