A popular song from 1938
Words by Dedette Lee Hill
Music by Willard Robison
The sheet music:
Accompaniment by James Pitt-Payne:
Lyrics
- Everyone knows him as old folks
Like the seasons he’ll come and he’ll go
Just as free as a bird and as good as his word
That’s why everybody loves him so
Always leavin’ his spoon in his coffee
Puts his napkin up under his chin
And that yellow cob pipe
It’s so mellow it’s ripe
But you needn’t be ashamed of him
In the evening, after supper
What stories he would tell
How he held the speech at Gettysburg
For Lincoln that day
I know that one so well
Don’t quite understand about old folks
Did he fight for the blue or the gray?
For he’s so diplomatic and so democratic
We always let him have his way - We always know where to find old folks
When there’s some little chore he can do
At the old liv’ry stable, whenever he’s able
Pitchin’ the shoes with lawd know who
Then he meets the late train at the station
Sits and whittles when it’s overdue
While they’re sortin’ the mail
Every night without fail
He’s sneakin’ a little nip or two
Every Friday he’ll go fishin’
‘Way down on Buzzards Lake
But he only hooks a perch or two
A whale got away
So we warm up the steak
Oh, some day there’ll be no more old folks
What a lonely old town this will be
Children’s voices at play will be stilled for a day
The day that they take old folks away
(Seems that I’ve heard some mention
He lives on a pension
He’ll never come right out and say)
Sung here by Laurence Rubenstein: