My Grandfather's Clock
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My Grandfather's Clock is a song written in 1876 by Henry Clay Work, the author of Marching Through Georgia. It is a standard of British brass bands and colliery bands, as well as popular in bluegrass music.
There are two competing theories as to the origin of the song. The most common relates to a wayfarer's inn in Piercebridge on the border of Yorkshire and County Durham called the George Hotel. The hotel was owned and operated by two brothers, the surname of both being Jenkins, and in the lobby was an upright longcase clock. The clock kept perfect time until one of the brothers died, after which it lost time at an increasing rate, despite the best efforts of the hotel staff and local clockmakers to repair it. When the other brother died, the clock stopped, never to go again. It is said that in 1875 Henry Clay Work visited the hotel and wrote My Grandfather's Clock based on the stories he heard in the hotel. It is said that the song is responsible for the common name "grandfather clock" to what are properly called "longcase clocks"
The song is also well known in Japan and to multiple generations. In 2002 a Ken Hirai recording of this song rose quite high in the popularity charts.
A competing theory holds that the lyrics were written not by Work but instead by C. Russel Christian, who wrote the poem about his grandfather, James P. Christian.
Lyrics
My grandfather's clock
Was too large for the shelf,
So it stood ninety years on the floor;
It was taller by half
Than the old man himself,
Though it weighed not a pennyweight more.
It was bought on the morn
Of the day that he was born,
And was always his treasure and pride;
But it stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
Ninety years without slumbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
His life seconds numbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
It stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
In watching its pendulum
Swing to and fro,
Many hours had he spent while a boy;
And in childhood and manhood
The clock seemed to know,
And to share both his grief and his joy.
For it struck twenty-four
When he entered at the door,
With a blooming and beautiful bride;
But it stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
Ninety years without slumbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
His life seconds numbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
It stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
My grandfather said
That of those he could hire,
Not a servant so faithful he found;
For it wasted no time,
And had but one desire,
At the close of each week to be wound.
And it kept in its place,
Not a frown upon its face,
And its hand never hung by its side.
But it stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
Ninety years without slumbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
His life seconds numbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
It stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
It rang an alarm
In the dead of the night,
An alarm that for years had been dumb;
And we knew that his spirit
Was pluming his flight,
That his hour of departure had come.
Still the clock kept the time,
With a soft and muffled chime,
As we silently stood by his side.
But it stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
Ninety years without slumbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
His life seconds numbering,
Tick, tick, tick, tick,
It stopped short
Never to go again,
When the old man died.
External links
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