Introduction
We All Live In Farm Country
Making Hay (Farmer Helping Farmer)
Kickapoo Valley
Use It Again, Sam
Introduction
My Mom was born in Minneapolis and grew up on a farm in Mora, Minnesota, 75 miles north of the Twin Cities. When we were kids we used to love going to the farm. I remember cousins and me getting spanked for pitching apples at each other from the trees in the front yard. Officially sanctioned activities, though, included riding Beauty the horse; climbing the ladder to the haymow and throwing down hay for the cows, playing in the hay and swinging from the hayrope, getting to steer the John Deere from Uncle Vern’s lap; shooting the shotgun and getting knocked over from the kick; stacking bales as we rode in the wagon behind the baler, and seeing the Holsteins in their stanchions.
Dad was born and raised on a little farm on the east edge of St. Paul. A son of Armenian immigrant parents, he didn’t learn to speak English until he got to school. Grandpa Dan built a combination house/barn with sleeping quarters in between. The heat from the cows helped keep the house warm. Dad went door to door selling eggs and cottage cheese. He ate enough chicken to last a lifetime!
Mom’s parents had bought their farm just before the Depression hit, so they were plagued with the need to make payments when times were tough. At one point Grandpa Oscar decided that he needed to sell a cow to get money for shoes for the five kids. It cost more to ship the cow to the stockyards in St. Paul than he received for the sale.
Decades later, I was hired as a researcher-interviewer-writer for the Kickapoo Valley Association History Project in southwestern Wisconsin. I was struck by the fact that at that time we were losing around four family farms a day in the state. I joined the Wisconsin Farm Unity Alliance and began writing farm songs. Roger King, ag instructor at Holmen High, had me sing for the elementary kids on their two-day farm excursion. I recorded and published two 45 rpm records and a sixteen-song cassette entitled “Farm Country.” It later turned into a CD, and I performed around the state and beyond. Here are a few of the songs from that and other albums:
We All Live in Farm Country
Words and music by Dan Eumurian
REFRAIN
We all live in Farm Country,
We need the farmer every day.
Food for the table, work for the able,
Farm Country, USA.
A dollar to the family farmer
Will trickle to the top.
On the way he’ll make it pay
Seven times before it stops.
It’s quite a task for those we ask
To feed us while conserving the soil.
They’re being beat by having to compete
With foreign funds and corporate oil.
They say small farms will have to fail
So supplies of food can be reduced.
If there’s a glut they ought to cut
What they help the rich produce.
Get the government out of farming—
At least the absentee kind.
What is more, they ought to restore
The family farms they’ve left behind.
Speculators make a killing; the honest farmer gets killed.
A family operation is in for the duration;
Some rich are in for dollar bills.
Let’s all pull together;
For freedom it would be too late
If we forgot how hard we’ve fought
Uniting the United States.
(c) 1986, Dan Eumurian/Come Thru Music Co., BMI
on “Farm Country” album, available in the Store on this website.
Making Hay (Farmer Helping Farmer)
Words and music by Dan Eumurian.
Thanks to John Pauley for the idea.
It was brother fighting brother;
it tore apart our land.
Each one thought the other
did not understand.
Six score and five years later,
a new war came about.
It was farmer helping farmer;
the enemy was drought.
REFRAIN 1
A civil war started today.
An attack against a need was launched
across the USA.
The colors didn’t matter—
black and white or blue and gray.
They’re making no distinctions;
they’re just making hay.
A regiment of tractors
mowed rich alfalfa down.
In the Northern states the sun preserved;
in the South it parched the ground.
In humble supplication
the needy farmers prayed.
When relief came from the heavens,
it began with bales of hay. (To REFRAIN 1)
The Lord had given bounty,
plenty and to spare.
He allowed the need to happen
and showed us how to share.
When the planes and trains and trucks invaded,
not a shot was fired.
The volunteers provided
what brotherhood required.
REFRAIN 2
A civil war started today.
An attack against a need was launched
across the USA.
The colors didn’t matter—
black and white or blue and gray.
They’re making no distinctions;
they’re just making hay. (Repeat)
It was people helping people;
they’re just making hay.
© 1986, Come Thru Music Co., BMI
www.LaCrossePiano.com
hope4you@centurytel.net
The recording of this individual song
is available on this website.
It’s also available
as part of the Farm Country album,
available in the Store on this website.
Kickapoo Valley
Words and music by Dan Eumurian
Something old, something new,
Something special is waiting for you.
Come and share our Southwest Wisconsin shores.
Ride a bike, drive a car;
If you’ve seen it, you know it isn’t far.
When you’ve camped here, you will want to call it yours.
REFRAIN 1
It’s a quiet sort of elation
When you’re living close to Creation.
Now it’s here for your recreation
In the Kickapoo Valley.
Something high, something low,
In the winter it’s blanketed with snow.
In the summer you can hike or ride a horse.
Something fast, something slow;
Come canoe it—your thankful heart will grow
Thru the beauty of the crooked river’s course.
REFRAIN 1
It’s a quiet sort of elation
When you’re living close to Creation.
Now it’s here for your recreation
In the Kickapoo Valley.
From the sky comes the breeze,
From the farm come apples, meat and cheese
While the river yields life to beast and loam.
From the woods come the deer,
From the branches, a symphony to hear,
And the sunshine gives warmth to plant and home.
REFRAIN 2
It’s a humble sort of ambition,
To come courting an ancient condition
Where’s begun a brand new tradition,
In the Kickapoo Valley.
REFRAIN 1
It’s a quiet sort of elation
When you’re living close to Creation.
Now it’s here for your recreation
In the Kickapoo Valley.
(c) 1980, Dan Eumurian.
Use It Again, Sam
Words and music by Dan Eumurian
In 1983, I was part of the Kickapoo Valley Recycling Committee. At a meeting in Readstown, in Vernon County, in southwestern Wisconsin, we were given bumper stickers from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that read, “Use It Again, Sam: Recycle.” That play on the old line “Play it again, Sam” inspired me to write the following song. I called the EPA to ask for permission to publish it. They said the slogan was in the public domain and basically told me to go for it. Several years later I was working on my third album, “Challenges: We Need Each Other.” My teammates and I decided to include the song. I recorded it with the late Gary Palen doing the vocals and electric guitar, and UW-La Crosse music professor Dr. Greg Balfany playing the sax solo. The song was also part of my first musical play, “Take It Easy on Yourself.”
Chip your plastic jugs and melt them down.
Give that worn out tire another round.
Save some cardboard, glass, and dirty oil.
Mulch your leaves and grass to build the soil.
REFRAIN
Use it again, Sam. Use it again, Sam.
Now is the when, Sam. Use it again.
Take the daily news that you have read.
Clip and file the best of what was said.
Bundle up the rest and have it shred.
Insulate the roof above your head. (To REFRAIN)
If you’re going to use aluminum cans,
Let a smelter take them off of your hands.
Separate the treasure from the trash.
The day of resource waste is about to pass.
(To REFRAIN, twice)
(c) 1992, Dan Eumurian,
dba Come Thru Music Co., BMI
on “Challenges; We Need Each Other” album