Cotton Needs Pickin'

DESCRIPTION: "Cotton needs pickin' so bad (x3), I'm gonna pick all over this world." The field worker describes how he contracted with the boss to raise the cotton, but now the boss is finding excuses not to pay him
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1918
KEYWORDS: work slave poverty money trick
FOUND IN: US(SE)
REFERENCES (3 citations):
Lomax-FolkSongsOfNorthAmerica 281, "Cotton Needs Pickin'" (1 text, 1 tune)
Curtis-Burlin-NegroFolkSongs-TheHamptonSeries (III), pp. 89-97, "Cott'n-Pickin' Song" (1 text with variants, 1 tune with variants)
SongsOfManyNations, "Cotton Needs A-Pickin'" (1 text, 1 tune) (CC edition, p. 10)
Roud #16391 and 17447
NOTES [105 words]: Since the first verse of this song refers to slaves being freed, it would appear to date to the period immediately after the Civil War. The Union forces had freed the slaves -- but the freedmen had no job they could do except work the fields. The landowners built up an elaborate system (Black Codes, Jim Crow laws) for keeping the Blacks working -- perhaps even at a lower cost, since they no longer had to pay for food and lodging.
Roud splits the Lomax song (#16391) from the Curtis-Burlin-NegroFolkSongs-TheHamptonSeries piece (#17447), but the differences are minor change in lyrics; they emphatically look the same to me. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.3
File: LoF281

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