I Catch a Da Plenty of Feesh
Channel: Stephen Griffith
Date: 2020-11-29

Day 256 of the American Songbag Stay-at-Home Series

Sandburg writes: "At Fishermen's Wharf and on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco they sing in such lingo as the heart commands. Harry Dick, Lillian Bos, and other occupants of crow nests on the topmost crags and crannies of Telegraph Hill, have heard this air and verse and have hunted a missing stanza about the selling of the fish."

Additional Info: This is only found, at this point, in Sandburg's American Songbag. Garibaldi was, of course, the soldier who (in a military sense) was most responsible for the unification of Italy. The mention presumably dates the song to the period around 1861 when Cavour (sometimes helped, and sometimes hindered, by Garibaldi) was unifying Italy under the Piedmont dynasty. (Traditional Ballad Index)