O Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie
Channel: Stephen Griffith
Date: 2020-03-26

Day 9 of the American Songbag Stay-at-Home Series  (folksongindex.com)

This arrangement is from a song known to boys of the Crossroads Club at the University of Oregon. After a recital and reception there one evening three years ago, we held a song and story session lasting till five o'clock in the morning. Nearly all nations and the seven seas were represented. A contingent from the Black Hills of South Dakota sang this version of "The Cowboy's Lament". They put their arms one another's shoulders, stood in a circle, and cried the lines almost as a ritual from lonesome flat lands, the arms on each other's shoulders signifying that no matter how tough life might be they could meet it if they stood together. They pronounced"wind"with a long "i" as in "find" or "blind," and said the cowhands always sang it in that classical manner.