Old-Time Sealing Fleet, The

DESCRIPTION: "Newfoundland has many stories that can make a heart beat fast." The singer recalls how the sealing fleet excited him as a boy. He tells how seeing seals inspired them, and of past disasters. He says that Newfoundlanders can still dream of heroic deeds
AUTHOR: Arthur R. Scammell (1913-1995)
EARLIEST DATE: 1945 (Scammell, Songs of a Newfoundlander, according to Ryan/Small-HaulinRopeAndGaff)
KEYWORDS: hunting ship disaster
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Ryan/Small-HaulinRopeAndGaff, pp. 140-141, "The Old-Time Sealing Fleet" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #V44748
NOTES [84 words]: For background on Arthur R. Scammell, see the notes on "The Squid-Jiggin' Ground."
Even at the time Scammell wrote this piece, it was becoming anachronistic; the sealing fleet was all but gone by the 1940s (see, e.g., the notes to "Last of the Wooden Walls" and "The Ice-Floes"). The mention of "Iron ships... and iron men" is even more anachronistic; steel ships had been all the rage around 1910, but they all but disappeared during World War I, sold off (mostly to Russia) for use as icebreakers. - RBW
Last updated in version 5.0
File: RySm140

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