1929 Immigration Song

[HoosierDaddy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ay_Z5adiMG8

 

["Skeet" McD]

The Argentines, the Portuguese (the Armenians) and the Greeks...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ay_Z5adiMG8

Thanks, HD: Fascinating, and--as someone who's spent a lot of time plumbing the depths of earlier popular song--a remarkably non-jingo take on the last big waves of immigration. For comparison....check out "The Argentines, the Portuguese, and the Greeks" from 1921 and, like the man says...make sure you listen ALL the way to the end! You'll find the sound file just ahead of the comments.

http://vitaphone.blogspot.com/2006/10/curse-of-mean-cicero-blues.html

Thanks again!
"Skeet"

 

[Marc Chevalier]

HoosierDaddy, this song you linked is from 1915, not 1929.


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[HoosierDaddy]

HoosierDaddy, this song you linked is from 1915, not 1929.


.

Hi Marc
You're right! The person who sent it to me had it labeled as 1929. I have no idea why.
Thanks
HD

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Unfortunately, though, this kind of thing goes in both directions: http://mightyminnow.wordpress.com/2...chilean-students-had-a-history-of-xenophobia/


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[vitanola]

The song, "Don't Bite the Hand That's Feeding You" was part of a concerted effort to demonize opponents of intervention on the side of the Triple Alliance.

In 1915, the sentiment in this country was strongly isolationist, with a substantial current of sympathy toward the Central Powers. "Don't Bite the Hand" , along with other bellicose anthems ("When the Lusitania Went Down") was written as something of a reply to the immensely popular "I Didn't Raise My Boy to be a Soldier":

Ten million soldiers to the war have gone, who may never return again.
Ten million mother's heart's must break for the one's who died in vain.
Head bowed down in sorrow, in her lonely years,
I heard a mother murmer through her tears;

"I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier,
I brought him up to be my pride and joy!
WHo dares to place a musket on his shoulder
to shoot some other mother's darling boy.
Let nations arbitrate their future troubles.
It's time to lay the sword and gun away.
There'd be no war today, if mothers all would say;
I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier!"


Remember that, to a great extent, the consensus behind our participation in the Great War was carefully manufactured. Bernays, Creel, and others had their work cut out for them, and history shows that they did it well. Even so, "Don't Bite the Hand" appears to have sold rather poorly, and seems to be quite scarce compared to "I didn't raise my Boy to be a Soldier", suggesting that in 1915/1916 the sentiment was still strongly against war.

Now, I have no particular opinion as to whether we SHOULD have participated in the War. The aftermath of the War certainly was good to our nation, and with the advantage of hindsight we cannot put ourselves in the place of our forefathers. History is what it is.

Note, too, that after the War Miss Nora Bayes' 1919 Columbia waxing of "The Argentines, the Portugese and the Greeks" was extremely popular. It is far more commonly found even today than any of the WWI songs, save, perhaps, "Over There". This number, which starts out as a comic lament about the new immigrants, who take all of the seats on the streetcars, sell newspapers, shine shoes, and barber, while at the same time occupying the best rooms of the most elegant hotels, driving the most expensive cars, and courting the prettiest American Girls, ends with the telling line;

"And the funny thing, when we start to sing "My Country 'Tis of Thee"
none of US know the words, but the Argentines, and the Portugese, and the Greeks!"

It appears that even in 1920 this nation of immigrants realised the cognitive dissonance inherent in our limiting further immigration, the merits of the argument entirely aside.

Then, too, on the other side of this coin, of course, there were the issues on the 100%, Hitch, and Vaughn labels, but they were specialty items which sold poorly and were targeted toward a rather narrow audience.