1869, AK: “A Desperate Fix” doggerel
Talk about quick action! Within a couple years of the USA taking over Alaska Territory from the Russian Empire, Yankee soldiers were creating folk art using Chinuk Wawa.
The soldiers of Company E, 2nd US Artillery, US Army Fort Tongass were reported as publishing their own little newspaper there — handwritten, I’d imagine!
Here, with our customary racist-content disclaimer, is a sample to add to our vast Pacific NW “Chinook-related doggerel” files:
A DESPERATE FIX.
Among such a bevy of beautiful equaws,
I hesitate, founder and flurry,
They’ve captured my heart with their dulcet wa-was, [‘words’]
And my senses confoundedly worry,
My peace is destroyed, and my balance upset,
Undecided I falter and tarry,
While the fair ones are sighing, and dying, and yet
I can’t decide which one to marry.There’s “Laughy” keeps laughing and smiles a broad grin,
As if the idea were funny;
And “Fatty” looks grave, with her fat double chin.
As she “trips” at the “heels” of old “Gummy”
“Lucy’s” soft glance weans my thoughts from my books;
”Gentle Annie” tips winks on the sly;
And that small bundle, “Maly,” apparently looks
Unutterable things with one eye.“Rachel Ann” is divine with a classical nose.
That a rival would kill with disdain,
And “Mika-name Sam,” with her broad pigeon toes, [‘your name is…’]
To distraction is driving my brain.
The other dear charmer, that sweet Simpsean [Tsimshian],
Would secure my affections, of course;
And “Mrs. McKay” would leave the “old man,”
If I’d have her, and get a divorce.But I say! look here, confound it, you know
I can’t commit foul bigamy,
Although in consequence every squaw
Should perpetrate Felo de se.
It’s a horrible fix; no denying the facts,
So I’ll fill up my rifle with rocks,
And blow out my brains. No, I wont, I’ll make tracks
To the sheltered retreat of “Cape Fox.”
— from the Cleveland (OH) Leader of September 27, 1869, page 3, column 3
