Daniel Decatur Emmett (October 29, 1815June 28, 1904) was an American songwriter, entertainer, and founder of the first troupe of the blackface minstrel tradition, the

Virginia Minstrels The Virginia Minstrels or Virginia Serenaders was a group of 19th-century American entertainers who helped invent the entertainment form known as the minstrel show. Led by Dan Emmett, the original lineup consisted of Emmett, Billy Whitlock, ...

. He is most remembered as the composer of the song "

Dixie Dixie, also known as Dixieland or Dixie's Land, is a nickname for all or part of the Southern United States. While there is no official definition of this region (and the included areas shift over the years), or the extent of the area it cover ...

Early and family life

Dan Emmett was born in

Mount Vernon Mount Vernon is an American landmark and former plantation of Founding Father, commander of the Continental Army in the Revolutionary War, and the first president of the United States George Washington and his wife, Martha. The estate is on ...

Knox County, Ohio Knox County is a county located in the U.S. state of Ohio. As of the 2020 census, the population was 62,721. Its county seat is Mount Vernon. The county is named for Henry Knox, an officer in the American Revolutionary War who was later the fir ...

, then a frontier region. His grandfather, Rev. John Emmett (1759–1847) had been born in Cecil County, Maryland, and after serving as a private in the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

and fighting at the Battle of White Plains in New York and later in Delaware, became a Methodist minister in the then-vast frontier Augusta County, Virginia, and then moved across the

Appalachian Mountains The Appalachian Mountains, often called the Appalachians, (french: Appalaches), are a system of mountains in eastern to northeastern North America. The Appalachians first formed roughly 480 million years ago during the Ordovician Period. They ...

Licking County, Ohio Licking County is a county located in the central portion of the U.S. state of Ohio. At the 2020 census, the population was 178,519. Its county seat is Newark. The county was formed on January 30, 1808, from portions of Fairfield County. It ...

and also served in the Ohio legislature representing

Pickaway County, Ohio Pickaway County is a county in the U.S. state of Ohio. As of the 2020 census, the population was 58,539. Its county seat is Circleville. Its name derives from the Pekowi band of Shawnee Indians, who inhabited the area. (See List of Ohio coun ...

in the

Scioto River The Scioto River ( ) is a river in central and southern Ohio more than in length. It rises in Hardin County just north of Roundhead, Ohio, flows through Columbus, Ohio, where it collects its largest tributary, the Olentangy River, and meets t ...

valley. His father, Abraham Emmett (1791–1846) served as a private in the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States, United States of America and its Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom ...

while his father served in the Ohio legislature. Notwithstanding his grandfather's career, Dan had little formal education. He learned popular tunes from his musical mother, and taught himself to play the fiddle. At age 13, Emmett became apprenticed to a printer and in 1836, when he was 21, enlisted in the United States Army. He became an expert fifer and drummer at Newport Barracks,

Newport, Kentucky Newport is a home rule-class city at the confluence of the Ohio and Licking rivers in Campbell County, Kentucky. The population was 15,273 at the 2010 census. Historically, it was one of four county seats of Campbell County. Newport is a majo ...

. Emmett was a

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

. He married Catharine Rives (born 1829) in 1853 in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

, and they remained together until her death in 1875. Four years later, Emmett married Mary Bird (or Browner; 1835–1917) in

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

; Emmett did not have children.

Career

After receiving his discharge from the army on July 8, 1835, Emmett joined a Cincinnati circus. In 1840–1842 he toured with Angevine and other circuses as a blackface banjoist and singer. In association with

Billy Whitlock William M. Whitlock (1813 – 1878) was an American blackface performer. He began his career in entertainment doing blackface banjo routines in circuses and dime shows, and by 1843 he was well known in New York City. He is best known for h ...

Dick Pelham Richard Ward "Dick" Pelham (February 13, 1815 – October 1876), born Richard Ward Pell, was an American blackface performer. He was born in New York City. Pelham regularly did blackface acts in the early 1840s both solo and as part of a duo or ...

, and

Frank Brower Francis Marion Brower (November 20, 1823 – June 4, 1874) was an American blackface performer active in the mid-19th century. Brower began performing blackface song-and-dance acts in circuses and variety shows when he was 13. He eventually intr ...

, he organized the

, which made their first appearance before a paying audience at the Chatham Theatre in New York City in 1843. Although blackface performance, in which white men painted their faces and hands black and impersonated caricatures of African-American men and women, was already an established performance mode at that time— Thomas D. Rice had created the character of Jim Crow nearly a decade earlier, and blackface had been widely popular ever since—Emmett's group is said to be the first to "black up" an entire band rather than one or two performers. The group's full-length blackface performance is generally considered to have been the first true

minstrel show The minstrel show, also called minstrelsy, was an American form of racist theatrical entertainment developed in the early 19th century. Each show consisted of comic skits, variety acts, dancing, and music performances that depicted people spec ...

: previous blackface acts were usually either an

entr'acte (or ', ;Since 1932–35 the French Academy recommends this spelling, with no apostrophe, so historical, ceremonial and traditional uses (such as the 1924 René Clair film title) are still spelled ''Entr'acte''. German: ' and ', Italian: ''inte ...

for a play or one of many acts in a comic variety show. Emmett is traditionally credited with writing the song "

". The story that he related about its composition varied each time he told it, but the main points were that he composed the song in New York City while a member of Bryant's Minstrels. The song was first performed by Emmett and the Bryants at Mechanics' Hall in New York City on April 4, 1859. The song became a runaway hit, especially in the South, and the piece for which Emmett was most well known. Emmett himself reportedly told a fellow minstrel: "If I had known to what use they outhernerswere going to put my song, I will be damned if I'd have written it." After the South began using his song as a rallying call, Emmett wrote the fife-and-drum manual for the Union Army. In 1862, Emmett published his own Fifer's and Drummer's Guide in cooperation with George G. Bruce. Emmett's song was a favorite of President

Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...

, who said after the war ended in 1865, "I have always thought that 'Dixie' was one of the best tunes I ever heard... I insisted yesterday that we had fairly captured it." Another writer named

William Shakespeare Hays William Shakespeare Hays (July 19, 1837 – July 23, 1907) was an American poet and lyricist. He wrote some 350 songs over his career and sold as many as 20 million copies of his works. These pieces varied in tone from low comedy to sentimental ...

(1837–1907) (pen name: Will S. Hays) claimed to be the song's true author. Members of the Snowden Family, well-known to Emmett in his Knox County youth, have also been named as writers of the song, namely John Baptist Snowden, a freed slave.

Death and posthumous recognition

After a tour that was notably successful in the South, Emmett retired to his hometown of Mount Vernon in 1888 where he died on June 28, 1904, aged 88 years. From 1893 to the time of his death, he was aided by a weekly allowance from the

Actors Fund of America The Entertainment Community Fund, formerly The Actors Fund, is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization that supports performers and behind-the-scenes workers in performing arts and entertainment, helping more than 17,000 people directly each year. S ...

. Emmett was inducted into the

Songwriters Hall of Fame The Songwriters Hall of Fame (SHOF) is an American institution founded in 1969 by songwriter Johnny Mercer, music publisher/songwriter Abe Olman, and publisher/executive Howie Richmond to honor those whose work, represent, and maintain, the her ...

in 1970. A biographical film of his life was produced in 1943, titled ''Dixie''. Starring Bing Crosby and

Dorothy Lamour Dorothy Lamour (born Mary Leta Dorothy Slaton; December 10, 1914 – September 22, 1996) was an American actress and singer. She is best remembered for having appeared in the '' Road to...'' movies, a series of successful comedies starring Bing ...

, it is a musical directed by A. Edward Sutherland. Numerous schools, businesses, and other institutions in Mount Vernon, Ohio, are named after Emmett. The official memorial to him is a large boulder with a placard attached located in front of the Knox County Historical Museum. Emmett published at least 30 songs between 1843 and 1865, most of which are banjo tunes or

walkaround A walkaround (also spelled walk-around or walk around, or called a horay) was a dance from the blackface minstrel shows of the 19th century. The walkaround began in the 1840s as a dance for one performer, but by the 1850s, many dancers or the ...

s. Between 1859 and 1869, he composed another 25 tunes that are in manuscript at the Ohio Historical Society in Columbus, Ohio.

Notes

References

* Crawford, Richard. ''An Introduction to America's Music''. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001. * Hall, Roger Lee. ''Lincoln and Liberty: Music from Abraham Lincoln's Era''. Stoughton, Massachusetts: PineTree Press, 2009. * Lott, Eric. ''Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class''. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. . * Nathan, Hans. ''Dan Emmett and the Rise of Early Negro Minstrelsy''. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1962 * Robert Stevenson. "Emmett, Dan." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. * * *
Free scores
at the Mutopia Project *

External links