Turkey in the Straw Origin Story Has Roots in Racism and Minstrelsy

“Turkey in the Straw” is a staple for lots of ice cream vehicles, but it surely has problematic origins. Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA has written a brand new jingle to switch it.

Every summer, ice cream trucks throughout the country cross about their daily trade of riding up and down neighborhood streets and blasting happy-go-lucky track to announce the arrival of candy, frozen treats. What many people don’t realize, then again, is that some of that “happy-go-lucky” song in truth has pretty dark origins.

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There’s one song in specific that seems to be especially popular with ice cream vehicles. You more than likely comprehend it as “Turkey in the Straw.” In addition to being the earwormiest earworm of them all, the tune additionally has a somewhat convoluted historical past with some very racist detours along the means. Here’s a quick abstract of the historical past of “Turkey in the Straw.”

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The origins of “Turkey in the Straw” pass long ago — and they take a deeply racist flip.

We will have to get started through mentioning that in the case of songs — particularly traditional folk songs — history hardly takes an immediate path from A to B to C. Many American folk tunes originated from different nations, then took on new lyrics and meanings (or several different versions of latest lyrics and meanings) over the years. “Turkey in the Straw” is one among them.

When new lyrics are related to an previous melody, the outcome is known as a contrafactum. Even in case you’ve by no means come throughout the note sooner than, you’ve almost certainly come throughout contrafacta — one modern day contrafactum is the “Jingle Bells, Batman Smells” version of “Jingle Bells.”

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Contrafacta are all over song historical past and are particularly prevalent in relation to American traditional folk music. In the case of “Turkey in the Straw,” the melody can also be traced back to an Irish ballad known as “The Old Rose Tree.” 

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Eventually, “Turkey in the Straw” had taken over as the maximum well-known contrafactum of the music. That came about to happen in the early 19th century, right round the time that minstrel presentations turned into fashionable in America. That’s when every other contrafactum — “Zip C**n” (using a slur regarding Black other people) — began to flourish. Over time, Zip C**n wasn’t only a personality in a song — he was a stock persona of America’s minstrel displays. 

We’re not going to dig too deep into the racist historical past of minstrelsy in this newsletter (we mentioned this was going to be a quick summary, after all!), however suffice it to say that at this point, “Turkey in the Straw” was already pretty darn problematic. And then it changed into even more so!

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In March 1916, Columbia Records launched yet any other contrafactum of “Turkey in the Straw.” This one was written by American banjo player Harry C. Browne (who used to be white) and it used to be known as “[N-word] Love a Watermelon.” (Obviously, Browne didn't censor the n-word in his racist version of the song.) The refrain went like this:

[N-word] love a watermelon ha ha, ha ha!

[N-word] love a watermelon ha ha, ha ha!

For here, they're made with a half a pound of co'l

There's nothing like a watermelon for a hungry c--n.

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As far as racist tune lyrics pass, you'll be able to’t get much worse than that, right? So, why do ice cream trucks nonetheless play the music in 2020? Great query.

In 2014, Theodore R. Johnson III delved into the racist history of “Turkey in the Straw” in two separate articles for NPR’s race and culture outlet, Code Switch (we imagine both articles required studying on the subject, BTW!). After explaining the tune’s problematic origins, he asserts that, even supposing ice cream vehicles are playing an instrumental version of “Turkey in the Straw” (and no longer certainly one of its fashionable, racist contrafacta), it’s inconceivable to disassociate the tune from its historical past of blackface, minstrelsy, and racism.

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“Turkey in the Straw” isn’t the handiest problematic ice cream truck music, either. Some ice cream vans play “Camptown Races,” "Oh! Susanna," "Jimmy Crack Corn," and "Dixie,” all of which are also rooted in America’s minstrel shows (and, therefore, racism). 

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Most likely, ice cream truck drivers are not knowingly blasting songs with racist roots at full volume as they try to entice kids to buy frozen treats. Still, it’s definitely worth learning the history of songs that are widely used like this. And when problematic origin stories come up, maybe just… choose a different song to play, right?

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Happily, that’s exactly what well-known ice cream brand Good Humor has carried out. Given the problematic history of “Turkey in the Straw,” the emblem teamed up with Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA to create “a brand new ice cream truck jingle for a brand new generation.” 

And wager what? It’s an ideal music that’s now not even just a little bit racist, which is strictly what you search for in a just right ice cream truck song, ya know? We’re certainly having a look forward to hearing ice cream trucks play this new song as a substitute of “Turkey in the Straw” — and now we’re craving ice cream. Anyone else?

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