"Steamboat Bill" is a 1910 song with music by the
vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...
group The
Leighton Brothers
The Leighton Brothers (alt. "Leighton and Leighton") was the name of a vaudeville performance team consisting of brothers Frank Leighton and Bert Leighton.. They also composed various songs, most notably "Steamboat Bill," the tune used in the Disn ...
and lyrics by
Ren Shields Ren Shields was an American folk musician born in 1868 in Chicago, Illinois. He died on 25 October 1913 in Massapequa, New York. He co-wrote the song with George "Honey Boy" Evans "In the Good Old Summer Time
"In the Good Old Summer Time" is ...
which became one of the first hit recordings in the United States through its 1911 recording by
Arthur Collins.
"Steamboat Bill" notably inspired two major works of American film with long-lasting influence: the 1928
Buster Keaton
Joseph Frank "Buster" Keaton (October 4, 1895 – February 1, 1966) was an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He is best known for his silent film work, in which his trademark was physical comedy accompanied by a stoic, deadpan expression ...
film ''
Steamboat Bill, Jr.'' and ''
Steamboat Willie
''Steamboat Willie'' is a 1928 American animated short film directed by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks. It was produced in black and white by Walt Disney Animation Studios, Walt Disney Studios and was released by Pat Powers, under the name of Celeb ...
'', the first
Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse is an animated cartoon Character (arts), character co-created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks. The longtime mascot of The Walt Disney Company, Mickey is an Anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic mouse who typically wears red sho ...
cartoon.
Content
The song is an extended reference to a famed 1870 race down the
Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...
between two
steamboat
A steamboat is a boat that is marine propulsion, propelled primarily by marine steam engine, steam power, typically driving propellers or Paddle steamer, paddlewheels. Steamboats sometimes use the ship prefix, prefix designation SS, S.S. or S/S ...
s, the ''
Robert E. Lee'' and the ''
Natchez Natchez may refer to:
Places
* Natchez, Alabama, United States
* Natchez, Indiana, United States
* Natchez, Louisiana, United States
* Natchez, Mississippi, a city in southwestern Mississippi, United States
* Grand Village of the Natchez, a site o ...
''.
It imagines a fictional steamboat, the ''Whippoorwill'', captained by "Mr. Steamboat Bill," who is determined to beat the record of the ''Robert E. Lee''. He threatens his mates with death if they do not follow his orders and commands them to use
cargo
Cargo consists of bulk goods conveyed by water, air, or land. In economics, freight is cargo that is transported at a freight rate for commercial gain. ''Cargo'' was originally a shipload but now covers all types of freight, including trans ...
as fuel if they run out of coal.
A gambler from
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...
(home of the
Kentucky Derby
The Kentucky Derby is a horse race held annually in Louisville, Kentucky, United States, almost always on the first Saturday in May, capping the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. The competition is a Grade I stakes race for three-year ...
) places a bet against Bill that the ''Whippoorwill'' will be unable to beat the record. Bill's obsession with speed causes the
steam engine
A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be trans ...
to explode, killing them both. The final verses imagine Bill and the gambler ascending to heaven, and his wife telling their children she will seek out a new husband in the railroad industry.
Analysis
A 1965 article in the ''
Journal of American Folklore
The ''Journal of American Folklore'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the American Folklore Society. Since 2003, this has been done on its behalf by the University of Illinois Press. The journal has been published since the society' ...
'' refers to it as a "
pseudo-Negro" song and a parody of "
The Ballad of Casey Jones
"The Ballad of Casey Jones", also known as "Casey Jones, the Brave Engineer" or simply "Casey Jones", is a traditional American folk song about railroad engineer Casey Jones and his death at the controls of the train he was driving. It tells o ...
". More recently, R. John Brockmann has called into question the time period the song is set in, pointing out that boiler explosions had not been considered an issue for steamboat captains since the 1880s. Brockmann suggests that the song recalls memories of the mid-19th century when such explosions were common.
Recordings
Arthur Collins, a
ragtime
Ragtime, also spelled rag-time or rag time, is a musical style that flourished from the 1890s to 1910s. Its cardinal trait is its syncopated or "ragged" rhythm. Ragtime was popularized during the early 20th century by composers such as Scott ...
singer, sang for the first recording in 1911. The song was a longtime hit in
Tin Pan Alley
Tin Pan Alley was a collection of music publishers and songwriters in New York City that dominated the popular music of the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It originally referred to a specific place: West 28th Street ...
and was covered as late as 1951, by the
Delmore Brothers
Alton Delmore (December 25, 1908 – June 9, 1964) and Rabon Delmore (December 3, 1916 – December 4, 1952), billed as The Delmore Brothers, were country music pioneer singer-songwriters and musicians who were stars of the Grand Ole Opry in the 1 ...
.
Cultural impact
Bolstered by the Buster Keaton and Mickey Mouse references, the song created lasting interest in steamboats and
showboat
A showboat, or show boat, was a floating theater that traveled along the waterways of the United States, especially along the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, to bring culture and entertainment to the inhabitants of river frontiers. Showboats were a ...
s. At least one showboat was actually named after the fictional ''Whippoorwill''. This boat met a disastrous fate when it was hit by the
1978 Whippoorwill tornado, killing 16 passengers and crew.
References
{{reflist
Songs about boats
Songs about death
Songs based on actual events
1910 songs