A popular song from 1916.
Words by Chas. McCarron and Chas. S. Alberte.
Music by Albert Von Tilzer.
The sheet music:
Accompaniment by James Pitt-Payne:
Lyrics
- I had a big surprise today
While in a ten-cent photoplay
I recently saw my old home town
Way down in Dixieland
It was simply grand
Just to sit right there, and gaze
On the scenes of bygone days
Made me yearn to return
To the land and people
I will love always
I even saw the same old mule
The mule I rode to school
Chorus
Down where the Swanee River flows
I want to be there
Down where the cotton blossom grows
I want to see there
My little sister Flo’
Keeping time with Uncle Joe
Singing a song and raggin’ on his old banjo
I see my dear old Mother
Oh, Lordy, Lordy, Lordy how I love her
When the birds are singing in the wildwood
My happy childhood comes back once more
My heart is sore
That’s why I’m going back where they care for me
Ev’ry night they say a little prayer for me
Down where the Swanee River flows
- I’d like to meet that movie-man
I want to shake him by the hand
I want to tell him that he wrote a grand scenario
He knew where to go
Plain as day upon the screen
Hezekiah can be seen
Lottle Mose on his toes
Looking at the cam’ra
Nearly spoil’d the scene
I saw the cotton white as foam
I saw my home sweet home
Sung here by Vancha March: