A Tombstone Every Mile
| A Tombstone Every Mile | |
|---|---|
| Dick Curless | |
| publication | January 1965 |
| length | 2:35 min |
| Genre (s) | Country |
| Author (s) | Dan Fulkerson |
| album | A Tombstone Every Mile |
A Tombstone Every Mile (dt .: "Every mile a grave stone") is a by Dan Fulkerson written and by the US singer Dick Curless captured Country song can. Decoupled from the album of the same name, it was released as a single in January 1965. The album reached number 12 on the Billboard Country Charts; the single made it to number 5 and was on the charts for 17 weeks.
background
The song describes the dangerous route through the forests and hills of Maine on US Highway 2 in the area around Haynesville in Aroostook County near the Canadian border. Many truck drivers who transported potatoes and other goods to the markets in Boston suffered serious, often fatal, accidents on this route. A dangerous hairpin curve in particular was a hotspot for accidents.
Dick Curless was from Fort Fairfield , a place known for growing potatoes and only about 27 miles from Haynesville. He retired there after his time as a soldier in the Korean War to recover from health problems. In the mid-1950s, Curless met Dan Fulkerson, who wrote the song A Tombstone Every Mile for him . Together, Curless and Fulkerson founded a new label with Allagash Records and the publisher Aroostoock Music . The great success of A Tombstone Every Mile gave Curless a contract with Tower Records , a subsidiary of Capitol Records .
content
The chorus describes the loss of life that the dangerous journey through the woods of Haynesville has claimed:
It's a stretch of road up north in Maine
That's never ever ever seen a smile
If they'd buried all them truckers lost in them woods
There'd be a tombstone every mile
Count 'em off there'd be a tombstone every mile
It is a stretch of road in northern Maine
He has never seen a smile
When they had buried there all the truck drivers who have been lost in the woods
would be a grave stone every mile
counting them off as each mile would be a grave stone
The first verse calls on the truck drivers to listen to the singer and pay attention to him, the second verse becomes clear, in which there is an urgent warning of the dangers of the road:
When you're loaded with potatoes and you're headed down
You've got to drive the woods to get to Boston town
When it's winter up in Maine better check it over twice
That Haynesville road is just a ribbon of ice
If you're laden with potatoes on your way down you
have to drive through the woods to get to Boston.
If it's winter in Maine, you better check it out twice
This Haynesville road is just a band of ice
The warnings are repeated in the third and final verse of the song.
Cover versions
The song has been re-recorded many times. Bill Kirchen re-released A Tombstone Every Mile in 1994 . Further recordings were made by Red Simpson (1967 and 2012), Nick Lowe (2004), Charlie Moore (2004), John McSweeney and many more.
In Stephen King's novella A Good Marriage , the song A Tombstone Every Mile plays a role when a discovery in the garage turns Darcy Anderson's life and marriage upside down. When the short story was made into a movie in 2014, Jaymay sang the song.
literature
- Clifford R. Murphy: The Diesel Cowboy in New England: Source and Symbol of Dick Curless's “A Tombstone Every Mile” . In: The Journal of American Folklore . tape 127 , no. 504 , 2014, p. 191-225 , doi : 10.5406 / jamerfolk.127.504.0191 .
Individual evidence
- ^ Dick Curless A Tombstone Every Mile Chart History . In: Billboard . ( billboard.com ).
- ↑ a b Dick Curless. In: rockabilly.nl. Retrieved February 5, 2018 .
- ↑ Tombstone Every Mile - Dick Curless | Songs, Reviews, Credits | AllMusic. In: allmusic.com. AllMusic, accessed February 5, 2018 .
- ↑ Tombstone Every Mile - Bill Kirchen & Too Much Fun, Bill Kirchen | Songs, Reviews, Credits | AllMusic. In: allmusic.com. AllMusic, accessed February 5, 2018 .
- ↑ Search for "a% 20Tombstone% 20every% 20mile". In: allmusic.com. AllMusic, accessed February 5, 2018 (American English).
- ^ A Good Marriage . Simon and Schuster, 2014, ISBN 978-1-5011-0442-8 , pp. 85 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
- ^ A Good Marriage (2014). In: imdb.com. Retrieved February 5, 2018 .