Ballads & Songs of Southern Michigan-songbook

A Collection of 200+ traditional songs & variations with commentaries including Lyrics & Sheet music

Home Main Menu Singing & Playing Order & Order Info Support Search Voucher Codes



Share page  Visit Us On FB

Previous Contents Next
Occupations                         261
105 MICHIGAN-I-0
This well-known song of the lumber camps, dated in the fifties, goes, with few variations, under the names "Canaday-I-O," "The Jolly Lumbermen," which has the refrain "On Colley's Run, i-oh," "Hills of Mexico," and "The Buffalo Skinners." For texts of these variants see Eckstorm and Smyth, pp. 21-25, GraPP- 37-43; Lomax, pp. 158-163; and Shoemaker, pp. 88-90. For a discussion of the song with notes concerning its author, its dissemination, and a text see Bulletm, VI, 10-13 For a "Michigan-I-O" text see Rickaby, pp. 41-42. Version A was sung in 1935 by Mr. Frank Madison, Grattan Center.
i It was early in the season, in the fall of sixty-three, A preacher of the gospel, why, he stepped up to me. He says, "My jolly good fellow, how would you like to go And spend a winter lumbering in Michigan-I-O ?"
2 I boldly stepped up to him, and thus to him did say, "As for my going to Michigan, it depends upon the pay. If you will pay good wages, my passage to and fro, Why, I will go along with you to Michigan-I-O."