The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1911-07-11

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Folks at Home" Better known as
Swanee Ribber." The story of how
this song came to be written is told
by Fosters brother, and will interest
many thousands who sing it and do
not even know that there is a real
Suwanee River. "One day in 1851"
says Morrison Foster, Stephen came
INTO my office and said to me, What
is a good name of two syllibles for a
southern river? I want to use 1t in
this new song Of old Folks at Home
asked him how Yazoo would do
On, said he, that has been used be-
fore then suggested Pedee. oh,
pshaw,' he replied, l won't have that
then took down an atlas from the top
United States. We both looked over
1t, and my finger stopped at the 'Su-
vance, a little river in Floriday empty
ing into the Gulf of Mexico. That's
it, that's it exactly exclaimed he, de-
lighted, as he wrote the name down
He left the office. as was his custom,
abruptly, without saying another
word" About this time E. P. Christy.
the famous negro minstrel, wrote to
Foster for song, and this one was
sold to him for $500. Foster made
about $4,000 from this song after
ward.
A faithful setter, given to Foster by
friend, furnished the inspiration for
odd Dog Tray" Another popular
song, my Old Kentucy Home" was
written under a tree that is still stand
near Bardstown, KY, where lived Jorn
Rowan, United States senator from
Kentucky when Stephen was born, and
cousin on his maternal side.
"Old Black Joe" is another peren-
NAL favorite among the nearly 200
songs that Stephens Collins Foster
wrote. The figure of Old Black Joe
adorns the pedestal of the monument
in Highland Park, Pittsburg. 1t is
symbol of the intimate sympathy the
poet and composer had with the life
Of the lowly black whose SORROWS had
joys he immortalized in his songs.
His Gentleness and Courage.
Foster was one of the simplest and
sweetest of souls. One Of his teachers
most perfect gentleman he ever had as
a pupil" He was on his way to a
party one evening when he heard that
little girl had been run over by a
dray and killed, and he went instead
to the stricken home and spent the
night there comforting her parents.
Yet his gentle spirit could develop the
courage of a lion upon occasion, as
when he came upon two DULLES who
fence rail he drove them to flight,
after a battle in which he received a
scar that he carried with him to his
grave.
So sensitive that the ticking of a
clock annoyed him until he had slowed
it away beneath tub in the cellar, in
order to be able to sleep, he locked
the door of his room to every one but
his mother when he was at work on
a piece of music. He removed to New
York once, because that was a better
market for his compositions, and in
year he had become so homesick that
he sold out his furniture, on a "a
hours notice, and went home to Pitts
burg. He reached the white cottage
in Lawrenceville, still standing, about
midnight, and, when his mother came
down to see who knocked so late, she
found him weeping upon the porch. In
spite of his love for his home he was
destined to die in the great metropolis.
In January, 1854, while at the Ameri-
can hotel in New York, he was seized
with a fever. Getting up a few days
later, he was so weakened that he fell
across a wash basin and cut several
serious gashes in his head and throat.
HI died in a hospital a few days later,
from weakness and loss of blood. His
fame was sufficiently established to in
duce the Pennsylvania railroad and
the Adams Express Company to trans
port the body and its attendants to
Pittsburg free of charge.
The Measure of His Genius.
While Stephen Collins Foster had
not the prodigious fertility of Schulz
ert, who composed seven other songs
on the same day that he composed
"Erlkoenig," or of Abt, who has over
5000 songs to his credit, his most pop
ular songs are sung by more people
and awaken deeper response than
those of any other composer. If we ex-
cept Home. Sweet Home" there is no
better beloved song than "Swanee
Ribber'
Foster has transmitted into unfad-
ing gold the melodic genius, crude and
stammering of the negro race. The
idyllic care-free life of the old planta-
ton, departed to come back no more,
lives in those tunes rollicking or sad.
What Chopin was to the piano, Fos-
ter is to the banjo-the instrument
brought by the slave from the jungles
of the Congo. This is his claim to
fame, and it is quite enough to rank
him high in the history of American
music His songs will live as long as
any symphony or grand opera of the
master musicians who are most de-
voutly worshipped. He died when he
was only SO years old, but IT may be
doubted whether the Psalmistss span
Of life would have made his fame any
more secure than it is. He and his
songs are beloved and that is the high
est assurance of immortality. Pitts
burg, where his daughter still lives,
cannot add to his renown by the erec-
ton of another monument, but she can
show that she appreciates the rich
ness of his genius, which received the
need of praise from sources so diverse
&C washington Irving and Ole Bull
nnTTVO CITnT