1891: A previously unknown Chinook song, and a naughty allusion
Today’s tally: one newly discovered Chinuk Wawa song (but canceled out by its being lost to us), plus possibly more evidence that the naughty “Seattle Illahee” was PNW-famous!
Tis has to suffice for a “Walla Walla Illahee” illustration (image credit: Up-to-the-Times Magazine)
Here’s the setup, from a social gathering of a fraternal organization aboard a steamship cruise near Seattle, early in the post-frontier era:
Only little social pleasantries of this character were indulged in until the steamer was well around Mercer island, when a spontaneous suggestion of some kind of fun or other started the mental energies of Mrs. Gordon. Accordingly she, in company with Mrs. Emma E. Shaw, of Walla Walla, and Mrs. Mary Hoska, of Tacoma, started in search of a victim, whom they found in the person of “Jake” Harding, of Port Ang[e]les. “Jake” is a singer, so the ladies marched him aft and surrounding him firmly informed him that he was required to sing.
He sang [said?] it was “Little Annie Rooney,” and he sang it well. Further efforts to make him musical, however, were not so successful, although Mr. W.R. Dunbar, evidently an old “tillicum,” gravely suggested that he essay a Chinook song. “Hyah-Klatawa-a-Walla Walla,” shouted the Goldendale prompter, but the warbler of “Annie Rooney” quickly responded with “Seattle’s good enough for me.” Messrs. Dunbar and Hoska “chaffed” the stubborn Port Angeles brother, but it was of no avail. Even Mrs. Shaw’s taunt that he “must have known something before he learned ‘Annie Rooney,’ failed of the desired effect.
— from “In Grand Conclave: Odd Fellows Take Firm Stand on Saloon Question”, in the Seattle (WA) Post-Intelligencer of May 14, 1891, page 7, columns 6-7
I’ve never encountered a Chinook song I could identify as “Hyah Klatawa-a-Walla-Walla”, which I think we have to take as a misprint of (Grand Ronde spelling here) ayaq ɬatwa Ø walawala, ‘Hurry to Walla Walla’. (That is, ‘quickly go [silent preposition] Walla Walla.) Maybe it will turn up in future research?
The fact that Jake Harding turned down requests for a Chinook song, and specifically one about a place, with “Seattle’s good enough for me!” brings up the possibility that he was making a joke. Everyone present would probably understand a sly reference to the infamous Pacific NW folk song, “Seattle Illahee“…
