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Jump Jim Crow

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Come listen all you galls and boys I's jist from Tuckyhoe,
I'm going to sing a little song, my name's Jim Crow,
Weel about and turn about and do jis so,
Eb'ry time I weel about and jump Jim Crow.

Oh I'm a roarer on de fiddle, and down in old Virginny,
They say I play de skyentific like Massa Pagannini.
Weel about and turn about and do jis so,
Eb'ry time I weel about and jump Jim Crow.

I went down to de riber, I didn't mean to stay,
But dere I see so many galls, I couldn't get away.
Weel about and turn about and do jis so,
Eb'ry time I weel about and jump Jim Crow.

I git upon a flat boat, I cotch de uncle Sam,
But I went to see de place where de kill'd Packenham.
Weel about and turn about and do jis so,
Eb'ry time I weel about and jump Jim Crow.

And den I do to Orleans and feel so full of fight,
Dey put me in de Calaboose and keep me dare all night.
Weel about and turn about and do jis so,
Eb'ry time I weel about and jump Jim Crow.
________________________________
Lyrics by Thomas "Daddy" Rice, 1828

Comments

  1. James FergusonJuly 16, 2009 at 3:33 PM

    I hope persons won't find this too offensive, but I think it is interesting digging into the minstrel show aspect of it, because this was the way many persons saw blacks at the time, and it was hard to rise above those stereotypical images. Even Stowe plays into them in the "Vaudevillian" type characters she comes up with like Topsy, who is supposedly beyond redemption until touched by Little Eva.

    ReplyDelete
  2. James FergusonJuly 16, 2009 at 3:41 PM

    The Lhamon book looks pretty interesting as he,

    ... quickly demolishes the myth of Jim Crow's origin by showing that "Jumping Jim Crow," a popular black folkdance, stemmed from African folklore. Indeed, a few blacks in the Georgia Sea Islands as late as the 1970s still "jumped" tales of buzzards and crows, the trickster birds. Daddy Rice, Lhamon claims, evolved his own trickster Jim Crow to give white society "the bird."

    http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/LHAJUM.html

    ReplyDelete
  3. NYT PerduJuly 17, 2009 at 5:24 AM

    "I's jist from Tuckyhoe"

    I went to Tuckahoe Jr. High near Richmond Virginia. We NEVER sang this song!

    Does the author go into the meaning of "jump"? Is it just related to dance? What about the slave marriage ritual of "jumping the broom"?

    ReplyDelete
  4. James FergusonJuly 17, 2009 at 3:00 PM

    Michelle Shocked did a variation of Jump Jim Crow with Taj Mahal on Arkansas Traveler,

    http://www.michelleshocked.com/chords_jump_jim.htm

    ReplyDelete
  5. TripplerFebruary 19, 2019 at 7:34 PM

    This reminded me of our dear friend Bob Whelan who was from Philadelphia where they have the annual Mummer's Parade every New Year's Day. While black face was officially banned in 1964 many marchers/revellers continued to use it for many years until it was stopped by officials. Yet even today brown/red face are used by many of those celebrators despite the fact that such characterizations are viewed as offensive by Hispanics and Native Americans.

    Nowadays past usage of black face in southern school parties have come back to haunt certain pols. Perhaps some day brown/red face will do the same for others.

    ReplyDelete

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