Lyr Req: Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People

Subject: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Susan A-R
Date: 03 May 99 - 10:00 PM

I remember hearing Pete Seeger sing this song on an old Folkways recording (I think) Anybody know it? All I can remember is something about Newspaper men meet such interesting people

I remember it having some pretty clever lyrics. Any thoughts?

Susan

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: gargoyle
Date: 04 May 99 - 12:08 AM

Something like "The News Editor's Prayer?"

Lord send us a tornado, a flashflood, a huricane or blizard....etc.

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 04 May 99 - 06:18 PM

It's on the old Peoples SongBook. My copy, alas, has vanished.

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: rich r
Date: 04 May 99 - 07:11 PM

The song was also recorded by Steve Addis & Bill Crofut on an album called "Such Interesting People". Would that I knew where my copy of that went to.

rich r

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Susan A-R
Date: 04 May 99 - 10:17 PM

Hmmm, Mr. Crofut surfaces again. That makes quite a lot of sense. I don't know about hurricanes or floods, but I do remember

something about a man who sat upon a steeple, just where the point was I could never see.

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 04 May 99 - 10:32 PM

Vern Partlow, journalist, communist, activist and great west-coast songwriter, wrote "Newspapermen" in the late 40s or early 50s. It's on Pete Seeger's "Broadside #1" album. Mine's probably too scratched to listen to but I'll try and get the words. Both Pete's Broadside albums are worth listening to. I'm not sure if Smithsonian Folkways are releasing them on CD or not. Where's Joe Hickerson when you need him? He'd come up with the lyrics fast.

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 04 May 99 - 11:06 PM

Hickerson is still non-computerized, I'm told, except when he visits his late place of work, the Archive of Folk Culture. Wish he'd get himself on-line! We sure could use him.

I've got the People's Songbook. I'll look up the song later tonight. Alan Chartok uses the Seeger recording as the intro music to his "Capitol Connection" show on WAMC in Albany. We hear it every week.

Sandy

Subject: Lyr Add: NEWSPAPER EDITOR'S PRAYER (Kenneth Burke)
From: gargoyle
Date: 29 Jun 99 - 05:44 PM

Sandy's link is here to the correct one:Newspaper Men

Found mine today:
NEWSPAPER EDITOR'S PRAYER
by Kenneth Burke

I pray thee, God,
Send us for tomorrow's copy
Some great flood or earthquake or disastrously erupting volcano
Or picturesquely havoc-bearing storm
Or other natural calamity such as we
In piety
Call "acts of God."

Or may there transpire some big new step towards greater global malice
Or may the peaceful work of the UN
Be disrupted by a new flare-up, with corresponding walkout.

Or may some admiral or general
Blowhorn about the ever-mounting power
To spread misery.
Or if there is to be no true disaster for this day
Then I pray thee
Send us at least conditions for some rumor
That we may flaunt it before the nation
In foot-high front-page headlines
(Being to truth dedicated
We can deny it later,
In a small item well hidden).

Give us, I pray thee,
Some such monstrosity
As a way of drawing papers to market
That our merchants may the better peddle their wares.

And then happily

Many thousands more acres of stately trees
(Such as young Keats called "solemn senators")
Trees that make a Cathedral of the forest
Will have been successfully processed,
Transformed into the printed yellow matter of journalism
By the rules of hygiene
To use once and throw away....

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Amos
Date: 09 Sep 02 - 01:57 PM

I'm looking for these lyrics myself just now. The parts I remember, from Seehger's Folkways "Gazette" LP, go roughly like this:

Oh, newspapermen meet such interesting people
---------------(blank)---------------------
They wallow in corruption, crime and gore.

There's a verse about Missus Sadie Someone who chops her husband up to pieces, and stuffs him in a trunk.

There were many clever verses to it.

Who's got those lyrics out there?????

The DT doesn't find anything on "Newspapermen". Unless I am missing a secret code?

A

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Amos
Date: 09 Sep 02 - 02:01 PM

SOrry, I found them on Gargoyle's link above which I had missed.

Thanks, Garg!

A

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 09 Sep 02 - 06:59 PM

To balance that 'Prayer' above, sing 'No News Is Good News' by Colum Sands with it!

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 09 Sep 02 - 07:04 PM

"Oh, newspapermen meet such interesting people!
They know the lowdown; now it can be told!"

DAve Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: GUEST,Skeezix O'Hara
Date: 21 Dec 03 - 08:02 PM

Ding a ling a ling, City desk
Hold the Press, hold the press,
Extra extra read all about it
Oh Newspaper men meet such interesting people
[Something or other] the power of the press.

I heard it once at a Pete concert and it stuck with me.

Subject: RE: Newspaper Men Lyrics
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 23 Dec 03 - 01:18 AM

The song is posted here. Thread #43842   Message #644264
Posted By: raredance
06-Feb-02 - 10:35 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People
Subject: Lyr Add: NEWSPAPERMEN MEET SUCH INTERESTING PEOPLE

NEWSPAPERMEN
(Vern Partlow)
^^
Oh, a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
He knows the low-down (now it can be told).
I'll tell you quite reliably off the record
About some charming people I have known,
For I meet politicians, and grafters by the score,
Killers plain and fancy, it's really quite a bore.
Oh, a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
He wallows in corruption, crime, and gore.

REFRAIN: Ting-a-ling-a-ling, city desk;
Hold the press, Hold the press;
Extra! Extra! Read all about it!
It's a mess, meets the test.
Oh, a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
It's wonderful to represent the press.

Now, you remember Mrs. Sadie Smuggery.
She needed money for a new fur coat.
To get insurance, she employed skullduggery.
She up and cut her husband's only throat.
She chopped him into fragments, and stuck them in a trunk.
She shipped them to her uncle back yonder in Podunk.
Oh, a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
It must have startled poor old Sadie's unc.
Ting-a-ling....

Yes, a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
I've met the girl with million-dollar knees.
The guy who sat five years upon a steeple;
(Just where the point was I could never see.)
I've met Capone and Hoover, and lots of other fakes.
I've even met a genius who swallows rattlesnakes.
Oh, a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
The richest girl who could not bake a cake.
Ting-a-ling...

Oh, publishers are such interesting people!
Their policy's an acrobatic thing.
They shout they represent the common people.
It's funny Wall Street never has complained.
But publishers have worries, for publishers must go
To working folks for readers, and big shots for their dough.
Oh, publishers are such interesting people!
It could be press-titution, I don't know.

Ting-a-ling-a-ling, advertising.
Ting-a-ling-a-ling, circulation.
Get that payoff, keep those readers;
What a headache, what a mess.
Yes, publishers are such interesting people!
Let's give three cheers for freedom of the press.

Oh, newspapermen are such interesting people!
They used to work like hell just for romance,
But finally, the movies notwithstanding,
They all got tired of patches on their pants.
They organized a union, and got a living wage.
They joined progressive actors upon a living stage.
Now newspapermen meet such interesting people,
Who know they've got a people's fight to wage.

Ting-a-ling-a-ling, Newspaper Guild,
We got a free new world to build;
Meet the people, that's a thrill,
All together fits the bill.
Oh a newspaperman meets such interesting people!
It's wonderful to represent the Guild.

From: The Peoples Song Book, Waldemar Hille, ed. (1948, 1959, 1961)

rich r

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Oct 10 - 11:20 PM

Newspapermen meet such interesting people
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9T5BQBNa4Q

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Jun 21 - 02:00 PM

… but publishers have worries and publishers must go to workin’ folks for readers and to big shots for their dough…

[ that’s just letting my mind find it’s own way I’ll probably come up with more, got together home and look for my broadside album]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People
From: GUEST,#
Date: 14 Jun 21 - 03:01 PM

There is a good take of the song at

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t36J581E1yg

I haven't checked all links on this thread, but many older links go boom.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People
From: Thomas Stern
Date: 14 Jun 21 - 05:16 PM

BEAR FAMILY - SONGS FOR POLITICAL ACTION
DISC 6, track 30.
Newspapermen Meet Such Interesting People - Vern Partlow