Carry Me Back To Old Virginia

Black History Month – February 17, 1997

I was born in Virginia. I love Virginia… but I’m going to tell you right now.. that’s not the place this old darkies heart longs to go… that’s right.. I said it!!

By now we all know that there is a concerted effort to have the Star Spangled Banner removed as the national anthem for the land of the free and home of the brave. I always knew there were more verses to that slave monger’s rant. As a small child I remember singing all the verses at a program we were doing in 2nd grade. No wonder they turned down the lights when we got to the part: “Their blood has wash’d out their foul footstep’s pollution. No refuge could save the hireling and slave. From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave, And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave, O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.” All I could see was the whites of their eyes…

But you would be surprised at the number states that have racist lyrics in their state songs. Hell, I don’t know why they just don’t get real with it and put a black man hanging from a tree on their state flag and be done with it. We already know how you feel… Anyway, on the anniversary of Virginia removing “Carry Me Back To Old Virginia,” as it state song on this day in 1997, I thought we would take a nostalgic trip back in time to the land of cotton, where old times there are not forgotten.. look away, look away, look away Dixie land.

Florida: “Way Down Upon The Swanee River (lyrics).” Somehow the racist in Florida thinks their darkies give a good one. They actually wrote a song about their slaves wishing the massa’s son would come back home so that he could take Big Sarah’s boy, “Dog Bone,” to the Vet so he can get that last tooth pulled out. “If he don cum bak, the massa goona pluk it wid dat long cuvd nife.”

Virginia: “Carry Me Back To Old Virginia. (lyrics)” You know, I keep running across a recurring theme in these racist state songs. Somebody’s got the idea that these ole darkies want to go back to the plantation. Somebody thinks that Lil’ Tat likes to rub the old Massa crusty feet. Aunt Gemima likes to bring corn biscuit dipped in molasses, freshly made from the sugar she gathered from the fields before “Boss Whipalot”, woke up, and Black Tom likes swinging from the tree Massa great grandfather planted, cause Lil’ Missy say, “Black Tom has sassy mouth.”

Kentucky: My Old Kentucky Home. (lyrics) You better keep yo eye on Kentucky. The other two songs mention darkies once or twice in their songs. Kentucky state song lets you know in every verse where you stand or to put it more truthfully:
“The head must bow and the back will have to bend,
Wherever the darkies may go.
A few more days and the trouble all will end,
In the field where the sugar-canes grow.” That’s right…Kentucky has now been upgraded to “Special Assessment Level: Confidential XXX.”

In 1928, “My Old Kentucky Home” was “selected and adopted” by the Kentucky state legislature as the state’s official song.^[ It has remained so, subject to one change that was made in 1986. In that year, a Japanese youth group visiting the Kentucky General Assembly sang the song to the legislators, using the original lyrics that included the word “darkies”. Legislator Carl Hines was offended by this and subsequently introduced a resolution that would substitute the word “people” in place of “darkies” whenever the song was used by the House of Representatives. A similar resolution was introduced by Georgia Davis Powers in the Kentucky State Senate. The resolution was adopted by both chambers. Klan members may remain active and fully loaded… :>)

Reprint © Hill1News 2019