From: phil@iagu.itd.adelaide.edu.au (Phil Kernick)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Puff the Magic Dragon (was Re: Calvin and Hobbes)
Date: 23 Nov 1992 00:39:34 GMT
Organization: Psychology Department, University of Adelaide
Distribution: world
Reply-To: phil@adam.adelaide.edu.au
NNTP-Posting-Host: iagu.itd.adelaide.edu.au

In article <1992Nov22.090852.15470@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com>, billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:
> : At a concert, Peter, Paul and Mary answered this one.  It's _not_ about
> : marijuana.
> : 
> : No, I don't have a direct quote, just a secondhand account.  (Yes, for the
> : purposes of this story, I suppose I am a FOAF.  If it's that important, I'll
> : have him post, he was at the concert in question.)
> 
> No need. I was at a concert where they made that statement. I expect that
> a number of other people who post here also heard it for themselves.


I've been watching this thread with interest, and it seems about time to
post some facts (what in this group!  can we cut his news feed :-).

In _Uncle John's Bathroom Reader_ they address this very question.  Their
reference was Bob Shannon's _Behind the Hits_.

Lenny Lipton was a student at Cornell in the late 1950s.  He was homesick
and had trying times adjusting to college and thought about the end of his 
childhood.  On evening in the spring of 1959, he went to the library [ed. 
note, a good idea for many folks.] prior to having dinner with a friend.  
He found a book of Ogden Nash poems.  In it, he was struck by the rhyme 
"Really-o Truly-o Dragon" and thought "If Ogden Nash can write that kind 
of stuff, so can I".  (Obviously, he had some self-confidence.)

He then left the library and headed to his friend's house.  During that 
walk, he thought of Nash's dragon and then his own.  He then put his
dragon into a little poem about the end of childhood.  When he reached his
friend's house at 343 State Street, neither his friend nor his friend's
roommate was home.  Being somewhat oblivious to the laws regarding 
trespassing, he went inside anyway and proceeded to type his poem on his 
friend's roommate's typewriter.  He cranked it out in three minutes and 
took off, leaving the poem in the typewriter.

As it turns out, his friend's roommate was Peter Yarrow.  Yarrow was
big on the folk scene even though he was an undergraduate then.  According 
to Lipton, Yarrow returned, found the poem, and wrote a melody for it.  Of 
course, Yarrow went on to form Peter, Paul, and Mary and they incorporate 
the song, "Puff the Magic Dragon" in their act.

Years later, a friend from Cornell mentioned to Lipton that he had seen
PPM perform this song and Yarrow said that Lipton had written it.

As it turns out, when this song began to look like it would be big, Yarrow
tracked Lenny down.  He had always listed Lenny as a co-writer, even while
Lenny had forgetten about it all those years.

On the drug meaning of the song, Lenny is quoted as saying it was about 
"Loss of innocence, and having to face an adult world...It's surely not
about drugs.  I can tell you that at Cornell in 1959, *no one* smoked
grass."  [sounds like a UL to me. Ed.]  He also says, "I find the fact
that people interpret it as a drug song annoying."  "It would be insidious
to propagandize about drugs in a song for little kids.  I think it's a
very sentimental tune."  Sounds like a real swell guy at parties.

And, as many know, "Puff" went to Number Two on the charts and was also
the basis for a series of cartoons.


Interestingly the place I got this information is - right here!

+--------
From alt.folklore.urban Tue Oct 15 12:18:09 1991
From: twcaps@tennyson.lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
+--------

The Terry's strike again!


Regards,
Phil "not a Terry and damn proud of it" Kernick.

--
   _-_|\    Phil Kernick                        "Sleep all day,
  /     \   University of Adelaide               Party all night,
  \_.-*_/   E-Mail: phil@adam.adelaide.edu.au    It's fun to be a
       v    Phone:  +61 8 228 5914               Vampire!"
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban