A popular song from 1912
Words and music by Irving Berlin
The sheet music:
Accompaniment by James Pitt-Payne:
Lyrics
- Millionaires, so the papers tell
Learned a dance that we all know well
Papers say that an extra swell affair
Was given by a millionaire
The rich four hundred, one and all
Had gathered there
Strange to say some reporter-men
Happened there with a pad and pen
They wrote down what they saw
And when the news
Was printed in the papers
People were reading everywhere
Chorus:
Doing that Society Bear
Hetty Green and Rockefeller
Threw their shoulders up in the air
Rocking like a big propeller
Someone cried, “Cuddle up to your Vanderbilt
Wrap me up in a beautiful di’mond quilt”
Mister Schwab was on the job
In a high-toned manner, playing the piano
Morgan cried, “I don’t give a care
Let me spend another dollar”
Throwing up his hands in the air
Mister Gould began to holler
“Stocks are going up, going up, going up
Stocks are going up, going up, going up”
So, come on, let’s kill that Society Bear
It’s a bear, it’s a bear
- Papers say, everybody there
Laughed out loud when an heiress fair
Kissed John D. where he has no hair at all
Then cunningly began to call
His head her lovin’ billiard ball, around the hall
Carnegie did the Turkey Trot
For an hour with a chicken that
Egged him on ’til he ‘most forgot to care
A snap about his libr’ry
Doing that rich Society Bear
Sung here by Laurence Rubenstein: