Cole Younger Song

This song is obviously not Cole's composition (although he was a model prisoner), and was probably a poem written for a northern newspaper before 1882, as it says Jesse was still alive. John Lomax collected a version for his 1910 Cowboy Songs. This somewhat different rendition was recorded by Texas cowboy singer Edward L. Crain in 1931, and re-released on the Folkways Anthology of American Folk Music. Dock Boggs recorded a fragmentary version using the Roving Gambler tune (Dock Boggs, The Folkways Years; Smithsonian-Folkways SFW40108), so when in1965 he performed at St. Olaf College in Northfield, he was visibly excited when he learned you could still see the bullet holes in the wall of the old bank building. We went there after the concert and took a picture of him in front of it as a tribute to tradition and those interested enough to keep it alive.

Complete Lyrics:
I am a noted highwayman, Cole Younger is my name;
'Tis deeds and desperation that brought my name to shame.

Robbing of the Northfield bank is a thing I'll never deny,
But which I will be sorry of until the day I die.

We started for old Texas, that grand old Lone Star State;
'Twas there on Nebraska prairies the James Boys we did meet.

With knives, gun, and revolvers, we all sit down to play
A game of good old poker to pass the time away.

Across Nebraska prairies a Denver train we spy.
I says to Bob, "We'll rob her as she goes rolling by."

We saddled up our horses, northwestward we did go
To the godforsaken country called Minnie-soh-tee-oh.

I had my eye on the Northfield bank when brother Bob did say,
"Cole, if you under-to-take the job, you'll always curse the day."

We stationed out our pickets, up to the bank did go,
'Twas there upon the counter, boys, we struck our fatal blow.

Saying, "Hand us out your money, sir, and make no long delay.
We are the noted Younger boys, and spend no time in play."

The cashier, being as true as steel, refused our noted band.
'Twas Jesse James that pulled the trigger that killed this noble man.

We run for life, for death was near, four hundred on our trail.
We soon was overtaken and landed safe in jail.

'Twas there in the Stillwater jail we lay, a-wearing our lives away.
Two James boys left to tell the tale of the sad and fateful day.

               "(Doc) Jennison has laid waste our homes, and your 'red' legs have

               perpetrated un-heard of crimes. I am here for revenge--and I have got it." 

                 "Bloody Bill" Anderson
at the Bullene residence
during the raid on Lawrence. 

                Any man who thinks he can be happy and prosperous by letting the 

       government take care of him--- better take a closer look at the

       American Indian." Henry Ford

"The Gun Is Civilization" by Maj. L. Caudill USMC (Ret) Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me via argument, or force me to do your bidding under threat of force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without exception. Reason or force, that's it. In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction and the only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some. When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or employment of force. The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal footing with a 19-year old gang banger, and a single guy on equal footing with a carload of drunken guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a defender. There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of bad force equations. These are the people who think that we'd be more civilized if all guns were removed from society, because a firearm makes it easier for a [armed] mugger to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the mugger's potential victims are mostly disarmed either by choice or by legislative fiat--it has no validity when most of a mugger's potential marks are armed. People who argue for the banning of arms ask for automatic rule by the young, the strong, and the many, and that's the exact opposite of a civilized society. A mugger, even an armed one, can only make a successful living in a society where the state has granted him a force monopoly. Then there's the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal that otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious in several ways. Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the physically superior party inflicting overwhelming injury on the loser. People who think that fists, bats, sticks, or stones don't constitute lethal force, watch too much TV, where people take beatings and come out of it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the gun makes lethal force easier works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not the stronger attacker. If both are armed, the field is level. The gun is the only weapon that's as lethal in the hands of an octogenarian as it is in the hands of a weight lifter. It simply wouldn't work as well as a force equalizer if it wasn't both lethal and easily employable. When I carry a gun, I don't do so because I am looking for a fight, but because I'm looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means that I cannot be forced, only persuaded. I don't carry it because I'm afraid, but because it enables me to be unafraid. It doesn't limit the actions of those who would interact with me through reason, only the actions of those who would do so by force. It removes force from the equation... and that's why carrying a gun is a civilized act. By Maj. L. Caudill USMC (Ret.) So, the greatest civilization is one where all citizens are equally armed and can only be persuaded, never force