Where We'll Never Grow Old: A Song History

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"Where We'll Never Grow Old" is a gospel song by James C. Moore, and Hymnary.org dates the text to 1914 and links it to Revelation 21:4 and 1 John 2:17.[1] The Discography of American Historical Recordings, drawing on a Library of Congress authority record, gives his full name as James Cleveland Moore and his dates as 1888 to 1962.[2] A 2013 newsletter of the Florida Baptist Historical Society says Moore was born in Paulding County, Georgia, studied at Mercer University and the University of Florida, and spent his life as a Baptist preacher in Georgia and Florida.[3] The same newsletter reports that the society holds a copy of his original manuscript of the song, dated April 22, 1914, and inscribed to his father and mother.[3]

Painted landscape of a sunlit valley with trees, a river and distant mountains under a golden sky

Asher Brown Durand, Landscape—Scene from "Thanatopsis", oil on canvas, 1850. Shown for its mood; it has no connection to the song.

The sources consulted here do not settle when the song was first printed: a hymnal entry on Hymnary.org credits Moore with both words and music and carries a 1930 copyright in his name, renewed in 1952 by R. E. Winsett, yet the song was already on record several years earlier.[4][5] The Jenkins Family recorded it for OKeh in Atlanta in March 1926, under the title "Land Where We'll Never Grow Old."[5] Alfred G. Karnes, accompanying himself on guitar, cut it for Victor at Bristol, Tennessee, in July 1927.[6] The Carter Family made their Victor recording in Atlanta in February 1932, with A. P. Carter credited as arranger.[7]

The Florida Baptist newsletter says the song has been used at funerals across the Southeast for about a century, and that Bill Gaither wrote to Moore's daughter in 1994 that the song would appear in a 1995 Homecoming video.[3] Hymnary.org now counts it in nearly two hundred hymnals.[1] Maureen Sellers includes it in Simply Gospel, Book One, a collection of 24 spirituals, hymns and old-time gospel songs in easy DAD arrangements for mountain dulcimer, published by Fingers Of Steel.[8]

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Sources

  1. Hymnary.org: "Where We'll Never Grow Old".
  2. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "James C. Moore".
  3. Florida Baptist Historical Society: "Here & Now, February 2013".
  4. Hymnary.org: "763. Never Grow Old" (Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs).
  5. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "OKeh matrix 9619. Land where we'll never grow old / Jenkins Family".
  6. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix BVE-39740. Where we'll never grow old / Alfred G. Karnes".
  7. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix BVE-71615. Where we'll never grow old / Carter Family".
  8. Fingers Of Steel: "Maureen Sellers, Simply Gospel, Book One".
  9. Image: Asher Brown Durand, Landscape—Scene from "Thanatopsis", oil on canvas, 1850. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.