Dear Forum members,

In his annotated volume of Mark Twain's lectures and speeches, Paul Fatout
mentions "an old Mississipi River song, 'Jan and Gan.'"

He says that Twain and George Washington Cable, when touring as "The Twins
of Genius" in the early '80s, used to sing it together when they were riding
from the train to their lodgings.  Their road manager, Major Pond, so
enjoyed hearing them sing it (so the story goes) that he would instruct
their driver to take the long way around to the hotel, so as to prolong the
concert.

Well, a few years back, I put together an hour-long narrated musical program
of Mark Twain's musical loves and hates -- minstrel-show tunes, spirituals,
Wagner, that kind of thing.  When I found the refence ot "Jan and Gan" I
thought it would be a wonderful item to include, but to my surprise it's
turned out to be absolutely, frustratingly impossible to locate.

I tried (I think) all the obvious sources.  Looked in every song index known
to library science, hunted through endless shelves of ancient songbooks,
talked to the Library of Congess, various southern cultural outfits.  I
called Alan Lomax & bothered him with it, even called Prof. Fatout's
surviving family.  Nothing.  Not a whiff.

It could be that Fatout got it wrong; or that if the song is still extant,
it goes by some different name.  And I suppose it's not impossible that it
simply was never written down, and it is now really & truly lost.

In any case, after several years of on-and-off searching, I, like Jim
Smiley's bull-pup, am feeling "sorter discouraged-like."  But now it occurs
to me that I haven't yet asked the Forum members for their ideas.

Therefore this appeal: has any of you out there ever heard of this song?  Or
does anyone have a bright idea about a new place to look?  Please e-mail me
if you do.  All suggestions will be received with boundless gratitude!

Best to all,

Pete Salwen
New York, NY 10010