Humbug Steamship Companies

DESCRIPTION: "The greatest imposition that the public ever saw Are the California steamships that run to Panama"; the "Golden Gate" and "Yankee Blade" promise to take people to San Francisco in comfort, but the trips is terrible
AUTHOR: Words: John A. Stone ("Old Put") / Tune: "Uncle Sam's Farm" by the Hutchinson Family
EARLIEST DATE: 1855 (Put's Golden Songster, according to Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest)
KEYWORDS: travel derivative humorous gold ship | goldrush
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest, pp. 30-31, "Humbug Steamship Companies" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #V32673
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Uncle Sam's Farm" (tune)
NOTES [121 words]: During the Gold Rush, there were three ways to get to California: Overland by various routes (long and dangerous), by sea via Cape Horn (long and uncomfortable) -- or by sea to Central America, where one might cross at Panama or Nicaragua and then take another ship on the west coast. This song is about the third method, in which the traveler might take the Yankee Blade from the eastern U.S., cross Panama, and take the Golden Gate the rest of the way. It didn't work all too well, as the song testifies -- and it gave the travelers two chances for their ship to sink; according to Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest, p. 22, both ships were lost in fairly short order, with 253 people dying in the process. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.6
File: LDC030

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