Over The River And Through The Wood: A Song History

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Lydia Maria Child first published these verses as "The New-England Boy's Song about Thanksgiving Day," in the second volume of her children's book Flowers for Children.[1] Sources differ on the date of that volume, some giving 1844 and others 1845.[1][2] The journey ends at grandfather's house in Child's original, and that house is traditionally identified with her grandparents' home at 114 South Street in Medford, Massachusetts, though the New England Historical Society notes that the link remains unproven.[3][2][4] Restored by Tufts University after 1976 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the house received a "Grandfather's House" marker from the Medford Historical Society in 1994.[5]

Wood engraving of grandparents greeting a family arriving by carriage at a snowy house doorway

Winslow Homer, Thanksgiving Day - Arrival at the Old Home, wood engraving, 1858. A family arriving at the old home on Thanksgiving Day in 1858, shown for the poem's subject; it does not illustrate the poem.

Born in Medford, Child (1802–1880) was also an abolitionist author whose antislavery writing, notably An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans (1833), carried real weight in her day.[6] John Greenleaf Whittier helped spread her holiday verses by printing a trimmed six-stanza version in his 1871 anthology Child Life.[3] Someone later set the words to the familiar tune, but the composer is not identified in the sources consulted here, and by about 1900 the song had become a schoolroom staple.[4] Mike Anderson includes it, credited to Lydia Child, in Hugo's Sing-A-Long Dulcimer Christmas Songbook, a Fingers Of Steel collection of holiday lead sheets with lyrics and chord symbols in DAD tuning.[7]

Our book that contains the song "Over The River And Through The Wood"

Sources

  1. Boston College, Boston Literary History: "Lydia Maria Child, 'The New-England Boy's Song About Thanksgiving Day,' Flowers for Children II".
  2. Tufts University Digital Exhibits: "New England Boy's Song About Thanksgiving Day".
  3. Clarke Historical Library, Central Michigan University: "Thanksgiving Day".
  4. New England Historical Society: "Over the River and Through the Wood: 7 Fun Facts".
  5. Freedom's Way National Heritage Area: "Grandfather's House Historical Marker".
  6. Encyclopaedia Britannica: "Lydia Maria Child".
  7. Fingers Of Steel: "Mike Anderson, Hugo's Sing-A-Long Dulcimer Christmas Songbook".
  8. Image: Winslow Homer, Thanksgiving Day - Arrival at the Old Home, wood engraving, 1858. The Cleveland Museum of Art.

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