Discover the history behind the song "Yankee Doodle." 

Sponsored by my favorite tea, Oliver Pluff & Company. https://www.oliverpluff.com/.

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Don Mast 

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Audio Song: Yankee Doodle by Robert Shaw; The Robert Shaw Chorale

The full version of the song as it is known today:

Yankee Doodle went to town

A-riding on a pony,

Stuck a feather in his cap

And called it macaroni.

[Chorus]

Yankee Doodle keep it up,

Yankee Doodle dandy,

Mind the music and the step,

And with the girls be handy.

Father and I went down to camp,

Along with Captain Gooding,[a]

And there we saw the men and boys

As thick as hasty pudding.

[Chorus]

And there we saw a thousand men

As rich as Squire David,

And what they wasted every day,

I wish it could be savèd.

[Chorus]

The 'lasses they eat every day,

Would keep a house a winter;

They have so much, that I'll be bound,

They eat it when they've a mind to.

[Chorus]

And there I see a swamping[b] gun

Large as a log of maple,

Upon a deuced little cart,

A load for father's cattle.

[Chorus]

And every time they shoot it off,

It takes a horn of powder,

And makes a noise like father's gun,

Only a nation[c] louder.

[Chorus]

I went as nigh to one myself

As 'Siah's underpinning;

And father went as nigh again,

I thought the deuce was in him.

[Chorus]

Cousin Simon grew so bold,

I thought he would have cocked it;

It scared me so I shrinked it off

And hung by father's pocket.

[Chorus]

And Cap'n Davis had a gun,

He kind of clapt his hand on't

And stuck a crooked stabbing iron

Upon the little end on't

[Chorus]

And there I see a pumpkin shell

As big as mother's basin,

And every time they touched it off

They scampered like the nation.

[Chorus]

I see a little barrel too,

The heads were made of leather;

They knocked on it with little clubs

And called the folks together.

[Chorus]

And there was Cap'n Washington,

And gentle folks about him;

They say he's grown so 'tarnal proud

He will not ride without 'em.

[Chorus]

He got him on his meeting clothes,

Upon a slapping stallion;

He sat the world along in rows,

In hundreds and in millions.

[Chorus]

The flaming ribbons in his hat,

They looked so tearing fine, ah,

I wanted dreadfully to get

To give to my Jemima.

[Chorus]

I see another snarl of men

A-digging graves, they told me,

So 'tarnal long, so 'tarnal deep,

They 'tended they should hold me.

[Chorus]

It scared me so, I hooked it off,

Nor stopped, as I remember,

Nor turned about till I got home,

Locked up in mother's chamber.

[Chorus]