"The worms they crept in"

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

the children's song is known as "The Hearse Song" and is described on
many websites as 19th century and traditional.  apparently it's in
Lomax & Lomax and in Sandburg's "An American Songbag".  it appears in a
recording of traditional music of western canada, in a collection of
WWII GI songs, in an alternative ending to Bonnie and Clyde, and cited
by Grissom on the tv show CSI.  it's everywhere.

the history of both the words and the tune are still entirely obscure
(to me).

On Sep 16, 2004, at 5:14 PM, Patty Davies wrote:

> ... this is too funny!  You are right, when I
> went on the site, this *is* the tune we sang to.  But I also think we
> had
> the version I posted previously.  I am sure my friends and I had no
> clue
> what pinochle was.  And in the meantime, I had a major memory flash of
> the
> song as the opening to a movie, and how delighted I was to hear it.  I
> remembered a dark haired actress and that it was a B movie, scary or
> horror, and positive the actress was named Pamela...Franklin!  And I
> just
> looked it up and it may have been "Legend of Hell House' (1973) but the
> site doesn't say anything about the songs used in the movie.  She was
> also
> in Screamer and Satan's School for Girls around the same time.

i tried the following searches, with no results:

"The hearse song" movie music
"The hearse song" "The legend of hell house"
"The hearse song" "Pamela Franklin"

on "The hearse song" Hitchcock, i get someone who pointed out that "The
Hearse Song" is similar to, but not the same as, the theme song for
hitchcock's tv program.

arnold