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From WWR

Trivia, story behind the song, etc.

Lyrics

George McJunkin was Shoeboy’s son
Born to slavery in ‘51
Down the arroyo where the flash flood ran
He found some bones and the Folsom Man.

Apprentice to his blacksmith daddy
Saddled with a chocolate hide
George McJunkin was a rebel
Who taught himself to read and ride.
When the Yankee soldiers freed him
He left and never said a goodbye
Hoofin’ it hard across Texas
He caught a stray mule to ride.
As a cowboy George knew no equal
Ridin’ up the long cattle drive
Ropin’ his way into legend
And readin’ at night ‘neath the sky.
George settled down in a valley
When the echoes of slavery had gone.
Working as a white man’s foreman
On the high desert dry Cimarron.

George saved the life of a soldier
Who granted a gift in return.
The brass telescope hung proudly
With his rope and his books and his gun.
He studied the stars in the heavens
And wondered where had the dinosaurs gone,
Learned about flowers and fossils
And the light in the mockingbird’s song.

George made a gift of his learning
And passed every bit of it down.
He played the guitar and the fiddle
And was loved as a friend in the town.
George never knew what he found there
On the Crowfoot arroyo that day
In the sand, the point of a hunter
Whom time had long hidden away.

Horse and telescope, books and gun,
George McJunkin was Shoeboy’s son.

Here is a song worth singin’
Here is a tale to be told
About a true American cowboy
A hero of pure black and gold.
In 1922 he lay dying
Among friends in the Folsom hotel
They read from his books ‘til their parting
He took to his freedom so well.

George McJunkin was Shoeboy’s son.

Listener comments about Shoeboy's Son (77077)

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Folk 5,709 items

Acoustic Guitar 9,326 items

Fiddle 1,572 items

Solo vocalist 11,262 items

Acoustic 9,775 items

Band 6,729 items