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"The Big Rock Candy Mountains" | |
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Single by Mac (Harry McClintock) | |
A-side | "The Bum Song—No. 2" |
Released | November 16, 1928[1] |
Recorded | September 6, 1928[2] |
Label | Victor Talking Machine Company |
Songwriter(s) | Harry McClintock |
"The Big Rock Candy Mountains", first recorded and copyrighted by Harry McClintock in 1928,[3] is a country folk song about a hobo's idea of paradise, a modern version of the medieval concept of Cockaigne. It is a place where "hens lay soft-boiled eggs" and there are "cigarette trees". McClintock said that he wrote the song in 1895, based on tales from his youth hoboing through the United States while working for the railroad as a brakeman.[4] It is catalogued as Roud Folk Song Index No. 6696.[5]