“Ballad of the Frank Slide”

Description

"On a grim and tragic morning In nineteen hundred three A little babe lay weeping... There in the shiv'ring morning." A rockslide buries the town; a few miners dig their way out of the mine to find the little girl -- and everything else ruined and dead

Notes

Although this piece apparently fits in well with the folklore of the Frank Slide, there is no evidence that it has ever gone into oral tradition. - RBW

Historical references

  • April 29, 1903 - A rockslide on Turtle Mountain falls on Crow's Nest Pass. Despite the legend that only one little girl survived the slide, in fact over two hundred of the town's three hundred inhabitants came out alive, and the town was only partly ruined

References

  1. Fowke/Mills/Blume, pp. 192-194, "Ballad of the Frank Slide" (1 text, 1 tune)
  2. BI, FMB192

About

Author: Robert Gard
Earliest date: 1949 (copyright)
Keywords: disaster mining death