Don Hufman’s Collection

The compiler of this list, Don Hufman, grew up in Fairbanks. His mother, Cay Hufman was a soprano and composer. The family arrived in Anchorage in 1925 and moved to Fairbanks in 1929. In 1936 Cay Hufman relocated to Oregon with her sons Robert and Don. According to her son Robert, his mother never stopped longing for Alaska. Her memories of Alaska, her love of the country and its people remained with her throughout her life.

Music and Lyrics

Alaska, My Homeland: Risvold, 1960

Alaska Rag: Malin, 1915

Alaska to Thee: Crawford, 1956

Alaska and the USA: Snow, 1923

Alaska, I Love You: Mangen, 1957

The Alaska Waltz: Foreman, 1934

The Alaskans: Livingston, 1959

The Blue Forget-Me-Not of Alaska: Noonan, 1934

By the River of the Tanana: Pearl and Hart, 1959

Congratulations Alaska, USA: Grimm, Lavere, Anson, Jason, 1958

It’s Daytime in the Night-Time: Noonan, 1934

The Esquimaux Maid: Tracey and Gardner, 1913

Flicker Red Flag: Darch 1953, The reverse of this sheet music lists 7 other Alaskan titles by
     Bob Darch, Published by the Red-Dog Saloon, Juneau.

Little Baby Eskimo: Fisher, 1957

Mollie, the Girl of the Yukon Trail: Walker and Barnes, 1928

Northern Lights: Beery-Davis, 1926

Pretty Eskimo, Fisher, 1958

Rika Jika Jack: Dawson, Sullivan and Hagen, 1946

Song of the Sourdough: Baker, 1947

Song of the Sourdoughs: Barnet, 1954

Spirit of Alaska: Chandler, 1952

 (Theme from) Klondike: Curtis and Minzzy, 1959

When the Ice Breaks on the Tanana: Page, 1961

Will We Remember: Kay Hufman, 1941
A bit of misinformation prevalent and accepted into the 1930s was that Denali meant "Last Home of the Sun." Despite Judge Wickersham and other authors referring to "Denali" as The High One. Hufman was unable to locate the author/source for this albeit romantic/sentimental version.

Unpublished Manuscripts with Lyrics

Homage to Cook Inlet: B. Kiem

Homesteaders Waltz: J. Catalone, 1960.

Klat-A-Wy: Kay Hufman and Wm. Craigie, 1941 with penciled notes (critique) by Robert Crawford

Land of the North (Sourdough Anthem): Byrne

Valley of My Dreams: Foreman, 1928

Legend of Denali: L. Donoghue and Arrom

Lyrics (In the form of paraphrase or parody
based on popular and well–known songs)

Anchorage Rendezvous Song: Sung to "Hinkey, Dinky, Parlez Vous" by Anton Anderson, Late 1930s.

Cheechako Lil: A variant of the above also sung to "Down Where the Wurzberger Flows" with words attributed to "Tin Whistle Jack" c.1898-1900.

Dog Song: sung to "Redwing" by school children, Council, Alaska, 1912.

Down where the Tanana Flows: Sung to "Down Where the Wurzberger Flows" written by Harry von Tilzer as a drinking song for the Broadway musical "Wild Rose", but not used. Introduced by Nora  Bayers in Vaudeville at the Brooklyn Orpheus Theatre.

George Carmack Song: Sung to "I Wonder Wy"– Introduced by Cad Wilson at The Tivoli, Dawson, 1898.

The Guy from Dawson City: Sung to "Ta-Ra-Ra-Boom-De-Ay" and "The Man who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo".

I like Humpback Salmon: Sung to "I like Mountain Music", early 1930s.

In the Chugach Mountains of Alaska: Verses by Mary Ramey and sung to "The Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia."

A Song of Nome: Sung to "Old Folks at Home", 1903

Springtime in Alaska: Sung to "Springtime in the Rockies", early 1930s.

When it’s Springtime in Alaska (Paraphrase of "Springtime in the Rockies") arranged for the Anchorage Community Chorus

They Don’t make Men like Mother Made. Sung to "It Ain’t Gonna Rain No More." Verses by A. Loftus and Mrs. A. Herring, used at the Pioneer Convention, 1961.

Reindeer Song: Sung to "Rainbow" by school children, Council, Alaska, 1912.

The Ballad of Yukon Jake by Edward E. Paramore, Jr.

Illustrations by Hogarth, Jr. (Rockwell Kent). The funniest and most famous of modern parodies – a little masterpiece. Coward.McCann, Inc. $1.00.  Copyright, 1921 by Vanity Fair. Copyright 1928 by Edward E. Paramore, Jr.

This famous parody, when it first appeared in VANITY FAIR, was probably more talked of and reprinted throughout the country than any other single poem of the decade. It was used as the basis for a moving picture, a Federal Court estimated its public at three and a half millions, it was set to music, recited over the radio and was twice reprinted in VANITY FAIR at the request of thousands of readers.

“Parodies are not rare, but good parodies are as rare as the roc’s eggs. That YUKON JAKE is a masterpiece of its sort few will deny. We believe it deserves a permanent place between the covers of a book.

The dust jacket said it was set to music, but the publishers Coward, McCann Inc. disclaim any knowledge of its publication. However, several older Fairbanksan say they remember singing songs from this book around campfires.

Lyrics (Verses and Chorus) Melody unavailable

Dawson City Belle

The Yukon Appetite

When the Boat comes ‘Round the Bend

He’s Sleeping in the Klondike Vale Tonight
(not to be confused with the version by Paul Roseland) by M.J. Fitzpatrick (before the turn of the century). Often sung at Pioneer funerals. Chorus is very reminiscent of a sentimental post civil war song, "Sleeping in the Battlefield."

Life along the Yukon (Is good enough for me) by Jack Brennen (or Brenner)

“Yenny of the Yentna” (Bain good enough for me): Late 1930s after the first Anchorage (Fur) Rendezvous was started by Anton Anderson (The 1950s “Squaws Along the Yukon- Are Good  Enough for Me” may be based on the two songs above. Anton Anderson was a former mayor of Anchorage. During the late 1950s he was interviewed by Jack O’Conner on KFQD and the song "I’ve a Yen for Yennie on the Yentas" was played.

When the Ice Worms Nest Again: By Frank P. Young, 1930s.

For several decades, the 20s, 30s and into the 40s, Frank Young of Fairbanks composed and performed clever, original material such as the songs above, as well as a parody songs including "The Smell of the Yukon", "My Shack in Kodiak", "Grass Shack in Hawaii”, "Moon Shines Tonight Along the Yukon" and "Red-Wing". It is not known where Young’s songs might be.

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The Ballad... OH, the North Countree is a
hard countree
That mothers a bloody brood;
And its icy arms hold hidden
charms
For the greedy, the sinful and
lewd.
*And strong men rust, from the gold
and the lust
That sears the Northland soul,
But the wickedest born from the
Pole to the Horn
Is the Hermit of Shark Tooth
Shoal!
* NOW Jacob Kaime was the
Hermit’s name
In the days of his pious youth,
Ere he cast a smirch on the village
church
By betraying a girl named Ruth.
*But now men quake at “Yukon
Jake”,
The Hermit of Shark Tooth Shoal.
For that is the name that Jacob
Kaime
Is known by from Nome to the
Pole.
*He was just a boy and the parson’s
Joy
(Ere he fell for the gold and the
Muck),
And had learned to pray, with the
hogs and the hay
On a farm near Keokuk.
*But a Service tale of illicit kale-
And whiskey and women wild –
Drained the morals clean as a soup-
tureen
From this poor but honest child.
*He longed for the bite of a Yukon
night
And the Northern Light’s weird
flicker,
Or a game of stud in the frozen
mud,
And the taste of raw, red licker.
*He wanted to mush along in the
slush,
With a team of huskie hounds;
And to fire his gat at a beaver hat,
And knock it out of bounds.
*SO he left his home for the
hell-town Nome,
On Alaska’s ice-ribbed shores;
Where he learned to curse and to
drink, and worse—
Till the rum dripped from his
pores.
*When the boys on a spree were
drinking it free
In a Malamute saloon,
And Dan Megrew and his
dangerous crew
Shot craps with the piebald coon;
*When the Kid on his stool banged
away like a fool
At a jag-time melody,
And the barkeep vowed, to the
hardboiled crowd,
That he’d cree-mate Sam McGee—
*THEN Jabob Kaime, who had
taken the name
Of Yukon Jake, the Killer,
Would rake the dive with his
forty-five
Till the atmosphere grew chiller.
*With a sharp command he’d make
‘em stand
And deliver their hard-earned dust;
Then drink the bar dry, of rum and
rye,
As a Klondike bully must.
*Without coming to blows he would
tweak the nose
Of dangerous Dan Megrew,
And becoming bolder, throw over
his shoulder
The lady that’s known as Lou.
*OH, tough as a steak was
Yukon Jake—
Hardboiled as a picnic egg.
He washed his shirt in the
Klondike dirt,
And he drank his rum by the keg.
*In fear of their lives (or because of
their wives)
He was shunned by the best of his
pals;
An outcast he, from the comraderie
Of all but wild animals.
*So he bought him the whole of
Shark Tooth Shoal,
A reef in the Bering Sea,
And he lived by himself on a sea
lion’s shelf
In lonely iniquity.
*BUT miles away in Keokuk, Ia.,
Did a ruined maiden fight
To remove the smirch from the
village church
By bringing the heathen Light.
*And the Elders declared that all
would be squared
If she carried the holy words
From her Keokuk Home to the
hell-town Nome,
To save theose sinful birds.
*So, two weeks later, she took a
freighter,
For the gold-cursed land near the
Pole,
But Heaven ain’t made for a lass
That’s betrayed—
She was wrecked on Shark Tooth
Shoal!
*ALL hands were tossed in the
Sea, and lost—
All but the maiden Ruth,
Who swam to the edge of the sea
lion’s ledge
Where abode the love of her youth.
*He was hunting a seal for the
evening meal
(He handled a mean harpoon)
When he saw at his feet, not
something to eat,
But a girl in a frozen swoon,
*Whom he dragged to his lair by her
dripping hair,
And he rubbed her knees with
gin.
To his great surprise, she opened
her eyes
And revealed – his Original Sin!
*HIS eight-months beard grew
stiff and weird
And it felt like a chestnut bur,
And he swore by his gizzard – and
the Arctic blizzard,
That he’d do right by her.
*Then the cold sweat froze on the end
of her nose
Till it gleamed like a Tecla pearl,
While her right hair fell, like a
flame from hell,
Down the back of the grateful girl.
*But a hopeless rake was Yukon
Jake
The Hermit of Shark Tooth Shoal!
For the dizzy maid he rebetrayed
And wrecked her immoral soul! . . .
*Then he rowed her ashore, with a
broken oar,
And he sold her to Dan Megrew
For a huskie dog and some hot eggnog,
As rascals are wont to do.
*Now ruthless Ruth is a maid
uncouth
With scarlet cheeks and lips,
And she sings rough songs to the
drunken throngs
That come from the sealing ships.
*For a rouge-stained kiss from this
Infamous miss
They will give a seals’ sleek fur,
Or perhaps a sable, if they are able;
It’s much the same to her.
*OH, the North Countree is a
Rouch countree,
That mothers a bloody brood;
And its icy arms hold hidden
Charms
For the greedy, the sinful and
Lewd.
*And strong men rust, from the gold
And the lust
That sears the Northland soul,
But the wickedest born, from the
Pole to the Horn,
Is the Hermit of Shark Tooth
Shoal.