Built in 1888 as a tobacco warehouse, converted to apartments and renamed the Dixie in 1921, it is quite "possibly Greensboro’s oldest apartment building... "
And so as Roy Carroll does his best to wipe out African-American and White history in Greensboro I thought I'd look into the history of the word "Dixie" and the song we so often associate with the word. From Wikipedia, I Wish I Was In Dixie:
"I Wish I Was in Dixie" is a popular song about the South. It was allegedly written by composer Daniel Emmett, a Northerner from Mount Vernon, Ohio, and published in 1859. Emmett's claims of the origin of the song were many and varied. According to one such version, Emmett was taught the song by the Snowden family of African American musicians, then freemen of color, with the lyrics coming from a letter written longingly of life in the south by Evelyn Snowden to her father. Emmett's blackface minstrel-show troupe debuted the song that same year in New York City when they needed a song to lengthen their presentation and it became an immediate hit. As with other minstrel show numbers, the song was performed in blackface and in exaggerated Black English vernacular. The song proved extremely popular and became widely known simply as "Dixie". The song has also been published as "Dixie's Land".
The song became the unofficial anthem of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. The tune's minstrel-show origins have created a strong association of "Dixie" with the Old South, despite the fact that it was written in the North. As a result, some today perceive the song as offensive and racist while others see it as an honorable part of Southern heritage. Abraham Lincoln, upon hearing of the Confederate surrender at Appomattox, asked the military band to play Dixie"
That's right, it appears the song, I Wish I was In Dixie was stolen from African American musicians, freemen of color, possibly from the American South dreaming of the families they left behind in search of their freedom. Possibly but not necessarily.
On Dixie as a place? Also from Wikipedia:
"According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the origins of this nickname remain obscure. According to A Dictionary of Americanisms on Historical Principles (1951), by Mitford M. Mathews, three theories most commonly attempt to explain the term:
1. The word "Dixie" refers to privately issued currency originally from the Citizens State Bank (located in the French Quarter of New Orleans) and then other banks in Louisiana.[4] These banks issued ten-dollar notes,[5] labeled "Dix", French for "ten", on the reverse side. The notes were known as "Dixies" by English-speaking southerners, and the area around New Orleans and the French-speaking parts of Louisiana came to be known as "Dixieland". Eventually, usage of the term broadened to refer to most of the Southern States.
2. The word preserves the name of a "Mr. Dixy", a slave owner on Manhattan Island, where slavery was legal until 1827. His rule was so kind that "Dixy's Land" became famed far and wide as an elysium abounding in material comforts.
3. "Dixie" derives from Jeremiah Dixon, a surveyor of the Mason-Dixon line which defined the border between Maryland and Pennsylvania, and, for the most part, free and slave states (Delaware, a Union border state, and slave state up to the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment, lay north and east of the survey line.)"
Being that it is established that Daniel Emmett, a Northerner from Mount Vernon, Ohio published the song, I Wish I Was In Dixie in 1959. (Note, published, not wrote. The song had been written some time before.) it appears most plausible that #2 "Dixy's Land" on Manhattan Island, New York where Slavery was abolished in 1827 was most likely the case.
Of course, for that to be true the lyrics to I Wish I Was In Dixie, as we know them today, were probably changed for the song to become the unofficial anthem of the Confederate States of America. That, or the song was written as a parody. As a matter of fact, according to Wikipedia:
"Countless lyrical variants of "Dixie" exist, but the version attributed to Dan Emmett and its variations are the most popular.[4] Emmett's lyrics as they were originally intended reflect the mood of the United States in the late 1850s toward growing abolitionist sentiment. The song presented the point of view, common to minstrelsy at the time, that slavery was overall a positive institution. The pining slave had been used in minstrel tunes since the early 1850s, including Emmett's "I Ain't Got Time to Tarry" and "Johnny Roach". The fact that "Dixie" and its precursors are dance tunes only further made light of the subject.[12] In short, "Dixie" made the case, more strongly than any previous minstrel tune had, that slaves belonged in bondage.[13] This was accomplished through the song's protagonist, who, in comic black dialect, implies that despite his freedom, he is homesick for the plantation of his birth:
I wish I was in the land of cotton,
Old times they are not forgotten;
Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
In Dixie Land where I was born in,
Early on one frosty mornin,
Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
Old Missus married Will the Weaver,
William was a gay deceiver;
Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
But when he put his arm around'er,
He smiled as fierce as a forty-pound'er,
Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
Dar's buck-wheat cakes an 'Ingen' batter,
Makes you fat or a little fatter;
Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
Den hoe it down an scratch your grabble,
To Dixie land I'm bound to trabble.
Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.[14]
The lyrics use many common phrases found in minstrel tunes of the day—"I wish I was in ..." dates to at least "Clare de Kitchen" (early 1830s), and "Away down south in ..." appears in many more songs, including Emmett's "I'm Gwine ober de Mountain" (1843). The second stanza clearly echoes "Gumbo Chaff" from the 1830s: "Den Missus she did marry Big Bill de weaver / Soon she found out he was a gay deceiver".[15] The final stanza rewords portions of Emmett's own "De Wild Goose-Nation": "De tarapin he thot it was time for to trabble / He screw aron his tail and begin to scratch grabble."[16] Even the phrase "Dixie's land" had been used in Emmett's "Johnny Roach" and "I Ain't Got Time to Tarry", both first performed earlier in 1859.
As with other minstrel material, "Dixie" entered common circulation among blackface performers, and many of them added their own verses or altered the song in other ways. Emmett himself adopted the tune for a pseudo-African American spiritual in the 1870s or 1880s. The chorus changed to:
I wish I was in Canaan
Oaber dar—Oaber dar,
In Canaan's lann de color'd man
Can lib an die in cloaber
Oaber dar—Oaber dar,
Oaber dar in de lann ob Canaan.[17]
Both Union and Confederate composers produced war versions of the song during the American Civil War. These variants standardized the spelling and made the song more militant, replacing the slave scenario with specific references to the conflict or to Northern or Southern pride. This Confederate verse by Albert Pike is representative:
Southrons! hear your country call you!
Up! lest worse than death befall you! ...
Hear the Northern thunders mutter! ...
Northern flags in South wind flutter; ...
Send them back your fierce defiance!
Stamp upon the cursed alliance![18]
Compare Frances J. Crosby's Union lyrics:
On! ye patriots to the battle,
Hear Fort Moultrie's cannon rattle!
Then away, then away, then away to the fight!
Go meet those Southern traitors,
With iron will.
And should your courage falter, boys,
Remember Bunker Hill.
Hurrah! Hurrah! The Stars and Stripes forever!
Hurrah! Hurrah! Our Union shall not sever![19]
The Confederate States of America War Song Goes Like This:
Southern men the thunders mutter!
Northern flags in South winds flutter!
To arms! To arms! To arms, in Dixie!
Send them back your fierce defiance!
Stamp upon the cursed alliance!
To arms! To arms! To arms, in Dixie!
Advance the flag of Dixie! Hurrah! Hurrah!
In Dixie's land we take our stand, and live or die for Dixie!
To arms! To arms! And conquer peace for Dixie!
To arms! To arms! And conquer peace for Dixie
Fear no danger! Shun no labor!
Lift up rifle, pike, and saber!
To arms! To arms! To arms, in Dixie!
Shoulder pressing close to shoulder,
Let the odds make each heart bolder!
To arms! To arms! To arms, in Dixie!
Advance the flag of Dixie! Hurrah! Hurrah!
In Dixie's land we take our stand, and live or die for Dixie!
To arms! To arms! And conquer peace for Dixie!
To arms! To arms! And conquer peace for Dixie!
Swear upon your country's altar
Never to submit or falter--
To arms! To arms! To arms, in Dixie!
Till the spoilers are defeated,
Till the Lord's work is completed!
To arms! To arms! To arms, in Dixie!
"The New Dixie!: The True 'Dixie' for Northern Singers" takes a different approach, turning the original song on its head:
Den I'm glad I'm not in Dixie
Hooray! Hooray!
In Yankee land I'll took my stand,
Nor lib no die in Dixie[20]
Soldiers on both sides wrote endless parody versions of the song. Often these discussed the banalities of camp life: "Pork and cabbage in the pot, / It goes in cold and comes out hot," or, "Vinegar put right on red beet, / It makes them always fit to eat". Others were more nonsensical: "Way down South in the fields of cotton, / Vinegar shoes and paper stockings".[21]
Aside from its being rendered in standard English, the chorus was the only section not regularly altered, even for parodies.[22] The first verse and chorus, in non-dialect form, are the best-known portions of the song today:[23]
I wish I was in the land of cotton, old times there are not forgotten,
Look away, look away, look away, Dixie Land.
In Dixie Land where I was born in, early on a frosty mornin',
Look away, look away, look away, Dixie Land.
Then I wish I was in Dixie, hooray! hooray!
In Dixie Land I'll take my stand to live and die in Dixie,
Away, away, away down South in Dixie,
Away, away, away down South in Dixie."
Imagine that. The lyrics, even the original lyrics do promote slavery. But that doesn't make sense unless of course it was meant to be a parody. Parody was commonplace in early African-American music just as double entendre is commonplace in another African-American musical form known as the Blues. Both parody and double entendre allowed song writers to say things they otherwise couldn't say in public settings and while most commonly used as a vehicle for comedy today, in more suppressed societies both are widely used as political tools to circumvent restrictions against free speech. Vocal inflections don't work in print and with recordings still years away it's impossible to know how the song was originally sung. The earlier Wikipedia entry I cited said the song was written by freemen of color, the Snowden family of African American musicians. Buy why would Evelyn Snowden and her family write such a song when she and her family were former African-American slaves from Maryland? Besides parody there can only be one of 2 answers.
Answer Number 1. Daniel Emmett, the white man from Ohio who performed in blackface minstrel shows, wrote the original lyrics just as he claimed he did. But according to Wikipedia Mr Emmett has conflicting stories:
"According to tradition, Ohio-born minstrel show composer Daniel Decatur Emmett wrote "Dixie" around 1859.[25] Over his lifetime, Emmett often recounted the story of its composition, and details vary with each account. For example, in various versions of the story, Emmett claimed to have written "Dixie" in a few minutes, in a single night, and over a few days.[26] An 1872 edition of The New York Clipper provides one of the earliest accounts, claiming that on a Saturday night shortly after Emmett had been taken on as songwriter for the Bryant's Minstrels, Jerry Bryant told him they would need a new walkaround by the following Monday. By this account, Emmett shut himself inside his New York flat and wrote the song that Sunday evening.[27]
Other details emerge in later accounts. In one, Emmett claimed that "Suddenly, ... I jumped up and sat down at the table to work. In less than an hour I had the first verse and chorus. After that it was easy."[28] In another version, Emmett stared out at the rainy evening and thought, "I wish I was in Dixie." Then, "Like a flash the thought suggested the first line of the walk-around, and a little later the minstrel, fiddle in hand, was working out the melody"[29] (a different story has it that Emmett's wife uttered the famous line).[30] Yet another variant, dated to 1903, further changes the details: "I was standing by the window, gazing out at the drizzly, raw day, and the old circus feeling came over me. I hummed the old refrain, 'I wish I was in Dixie,' and the inspiration struck me. I took my pen and in ten minutes had written the first verses with music. The remaining verses were easy."[31] In his final years, Emmett even claimed to have written the song years before he had moved to New York.[32] A Washington Post article supports this, giving a composition date of 1843.[33]
Emmett published "Dixie" (under the title "I Wish I Was in Dixie's Land") on 21 June 1860 through Firth, Pond & Co. in New York. The original manuscript has been lost; extant copies were made during Emmett's retirement, starting in the 1890s. Emmett's tardiness registering the copyright for the song allowed it to proliferate among other minstrel groups and variety show performers. Rival editions and variations multiplied in songbooks, newspapers and broadsides. The earliest of these that is known today is a copyrighted edition for piano from the John Church Company of Cincinnati, published on 26 June 1860. Other publishers attributed completely made-up composers with the song: "Jerry Blossom" and "Dixie, Jr.", among others.[34] The most serious of these challenges during Emmett's lifetime came from Southerner William Shakespeare Hays; this claimant attempted to prove his allegations through a Southern historical society, but he died before they could produce any conclusive evidence.[35] By 1908, four years after Emmett's death, no fewer than 37 people had claimed the song as theirs.[36]
"Dixie" is the only song Emmett ever claimed to have written in a burst of inspiration, and analysis of Emmett's notes and writings shows "a meticulous copyist, [who] spent countless hours collecting and composing songs and sayings for the minstrel stage ... ; little evidence was left for the improvisational moment."[37] The New York Clipper wrote in 1872 that "[Emmett's] claim to authorship of 'Dixie' was and is still disputed, both in and out of the minstrel profession."[38] Emmett himself said, "Show people generally, if not always, have the chance to hear every local song as they pass through the different sections of [the] country, and particularly so with minstrel companies, who are always on the look out for songs and sayings that will answer their business."[39] He claimed at one point to have based the first part of "Dixie" on "Come Philander Let's Be Marchin, Every One for His True Love Searchin", which he described as a "song of his childhood days". Musical analysis does show some similarities in the melodic outline, but the songs are not closely related.[40] Emmett also credited "Dixie" to an old circus song.[32] Despite the disputed authorship, Firth, Pond & Co. paid Emmett $300 for all rights to "Dixie" on 11 February 1861, perhaps fearing complications spurred by the impending Civil War.[41]
Possible African American origin
On at least one occasion, Emmett attributed "Dixie" to an unnamed Southern black man,[32] and some of his contemporaries said that the song was based on an old African American folk tune. Taken at face value, these claims are hardly surprising, as minstrels often billed themselves as authentic delineators of slave material. Names of these chance-met black songwriters were rarely given.[43]
Lew and Ben Snowden on banjo and fiddle in the second-story gable of their home, Clinton, Knox County, Ohio, c. 1890s.
However, a Mount Vernon, Ohio, tradition, which dates to the 1910s or 1920s at the latest,[44] lends some credence to this notion. Many Mount Vernon residents claim that Emmett collaborated informally with a pair of black musicians named Ben and Lew Snowden. Those who remember the Snowden brothers describe them as "informal", "spontaneous", "creative", and "relatively free of concern over ownership" of their songs.[45] The Snowden brothers were part of the Snowden Family Band, which was well known for traveling about the region. That Emmett might have met and played with these local celebrities is hardly surprising. The story is well enough known that the grave marker for Ben and Lew Snowden, set in 1976 by the black American Legion post, reads, "They taught 'Dixie' to Dan Emmett".[46]
The Snowden theory has, however, one serious flaw. While Emmett likely did meet and play with Ben and Lew Snowden when he retired to Knox County, the Snowden brothers would have been only small children at the time Emmett composed "Dixie". Howard L. Sacks and Judith Sacks suggest that the Ohio legend may in fact be off by a generation, and that Emmett could have collaborated instead with the Snowden parents, Thomas and Ellen. This idea dates to at least 1978, in a genealogical history of the Robert Greer family of Knox County.[47]
Circumstantial evidence suggests that this is possible. Emmett's grandparents owned the farm adjacent to the Snowden homestead, and Emmett's father was one of a few blacksmiths to whom Thomas Snowden could have brought his horses for shoeing. Furthermore, an unpublished biography of Emmett, written in 1935 by a friend of the Emmett family, Mary McClane, says that Emmett visited Mt. Vernon several times from 1835 until the 1860s and toured the surrounding area giving fiddle performances.[48] Emmett certainly refers to Knox County in other songs, including "Seely Simpkins Jig", which refers to a fiddler there, and "Owl Creek Quickstep", which is named for an early settlement in the area.[49]
Advocates of the Snowden theory believe that the lyrics of "Dixie" are a protest through irony and parody against the institution of slavery. The references to "Cimmon seed an' sandy bottom" in one version of the song may refer to Nanjemoy, Maryland, Ellen Snowden's birthplace, and located in an area that was known for its persimmons and sandy, wet lowlands.[50] Slaves rarely knew their exact birth date, instead recalling broad details that someone was born, for example, "Early on one frosty mornin'". A domestic slave, as Ellen Snowden had been, would have been well placed to witness a love affair between "Old Missus" and "Will-de-weaber". Food imagery, such as "buck-wheat cake" and "'Ingen' batter", further points to a writer who had some experience as a cook."
Answer Number 2. The Snowden lyrics were never published, are not the same as any of the lyrics we have today and were probably not written to promote slavery.
No, we have no final conclusions as to the history of the name "Dixie" or the song that pays tribute to a time and place loved by a few and hated by many more but what we do have is a building so named, a reminder to never do that again. The only such building in Greensboro.
And when the reminders are all gone will we forget our horrid past just as we've forgotten the origins of Dixie and the song that pays tribute to the place. And will we then do it all over again?
