American Negro Folklore (1968)

[Beverly Flanigan]

At 02:56 PM 2/13/2005, you wrote:
>Mark A. Mandel wrote:
>>Wilson inquires:
>>
>>>Old Dan Tucker was a fine old man,
>>>Washed his face in a fryin' pan,
>>>Combed his hair with a wagon wheel,
>>>Died with the toothache in his heel.
>>>
>>>          ---Old Minstrel Song, "Old Dan Tucker"
>>>
>>>JL
>>
>>
>>Is this the same song that has the verse (or chorus?):
>>
>>Get out of the way of old Dan Tucker
>>Too late to get his supper
>>Supper's over and dinner's cookin'
>>Old Dan Tucker just standin' there lookin'
>>
>>Wilson, just wondering
>><<<<
>>
>>Yup. (Though I learned it with "breakfast" instead of "dinner".)
>
>Aha...somebody else for whom "dinner" and "supper" can refer to the same
>meal!
>
>Alice Faber

Me too--unless, as in my childhood, dinner was the noonday meal, in which
case Dan would have to wait all the way from supper one night until noon
the next day.

But for the prosody (not that that might have mattered to some singers), I
always said (and heard) "He's too late ..." and "... just stands there
lookin'."  He was also mean, not fine.  Toothache also doesn't ring a
bell--bullet, maybe?