Hut that's Upside Down, The

DESCRIPTION: The singer has travelled many places, but now is "anchored hard and fast in the hut that's upside down." He describes the wild behaviors there -- gambling, frantic shearing, and watching the cook beat a brownie or dance a highland fling
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1955
KEYWORDS: rambling sheep Australia cook
FOUND IN: Australia
REFERENCES (3 citations):
Meredith/Anderson-FolkSongsOfAustralia, pp. 58-59, "The Hut that's Upside Down" (1 text, 1 tune)
Fahey-PintPotAndBilly, pp. 62-63, "The Hut that's Upside Down" (1 text, 1 tune)
Meredith/Scott-AuthenticAustralianBushBallads, pp 4-5, "The Hut That's Upside Down" (1 text, 1 tune)
NOTES [95 words]: Thought to refer to a shed in Big Burrawang in New South Wales. Meredith and Anderson report that this shed was "so big that a wooden tramway ran around it to move the wool."
Edward E. Morris, A Dictionary of Austral English, 1898 (I use the 1972 Sydney University Press with a new foreword but no new content), p. 207, defines "Hut" as follows: "a cottage of a shepherd or a miner. The word is English but is especially common in Australia, and does not there connote squalor or meanness. The "Men's Hut' on a station is the building occupied by the male employees." - RBW
Last updated in version 6.4
File: MA058

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