Yankee Doodle Boy: A Song History
George M. Cohan wrote both the words and the music of "The Yankee Doodle Boy" for his musical Little Johnny Jones, and he sang it himself in the title role.[1] The show opened at the Liberty Theatre in New York on November 7, 1904, closed on December 24 after 52 performances, and returned to Broadway twice in 1905.[1] The title character is an American jockey in London, and the National Portrait Gallery, which gives the song as "(I'm a) Yankee Doodle Dandy," credits the life of the real jockey Tod Sloan with inspiring the show.[2][3] F. A. Mills of New York published the song as sheet music in 1904.[4]
Winslow Homer, Fire-Works on the Night of the Fourth of July, from Harper’s Weekly, wood engraving, July 11, 1868. Shown for its subject; it has no connection to the song.
The Discography of American Historical Recordings dates Billy Murray's Columbia recording of the song to between 1904 and February 1905.[5] Murray recorded it again for Victor on November 9, 1905, in a version issued as Victor 4229.[6] In 1942 Warner Bros. released Yankee Doodle Dandy, a film of Cohan's life directed by Michael Curtiz, with James Cagney as Cohan and "The Yankee Doodle Boy" among its songs.[7] According to the American Film Institute's catalog, the production hurried to complete the picture before the ailing Cohan's death, which came on November 5, 1942.[7] Cagney won the Academy Award for best actor for the part.[8]
Cohan's patriotic songs also brought him an official honor: a 1936 act of Congress authorized a gold medal honoring him for "Over There" and "A Grand Old Flag," though the House of Representatives' historians note that the legislation stated the medal was not in the name of Congress.[9] The House history page says President Franklin D. Roosevelt presented it, and the National Endowment for the Arts dates the presentation to 1940.[9][10] Shelley Stevens includes "Yankee Doodle Boy," along with both of those Cohan songs, in Baker's Dozen #13: Patriotic Tunes, a collection of fifteen service songs, old-school patriotic numbers, and traditional American favorites, all in DAD tuning with no capo needed, published by Fingers Of Steel.[11]
Sources
- Internet Broadway Database: "Little Johnny Jones" (Original Broadway, 1904).
- Brown University Library: "George M. Cohan" (Broadway musical exhibit).
- National Portrait Gallery: "Tod Sloan: Jockeying to Fame in the 1890s".
- Library of Congress: "The yankee doodle boy" (New York: F. A. Mills, 1904).
- Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Columbia matrix 3051. Yankee Doodle boy / Billy Murray".
- Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix A-1991. The Yankee Doodle boy / Billy Murray".
- AFI Catalog of Feature Films: "Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)".
- Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: "The 15th Academy Awards (1943)".
- US House of Representatives, History, Art & Archives: "Congressional Gold Medal Recipients".
- National Endowment for the Arts: "10 Things You Didn't Know About George M. Cohan".
- Fingers Of Steel: "Shelley Stevens, Baker's Dozen #13: Patriotic Tunes".
- Image: Winslow Homer, Fire-Works on the Night of the Fourth of July, from Harper’s Weekly, wood engraving, July 11, 1868. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.