Album: other songs

13: Cornered

Here in northeast Ohio, back in eighteen-o-three
James and Dean Heaton found the ore that was linin‘ yellow creek
They built a blast furnace here along the shore
And they made the cannonballs that helped the Union win the war

Here in Youngstown, here in Youngstown
My sweet Jenny I’m sinkin‘ down, here darlin‘ in Youngstown

Well my daddy worked the furnaces, kept them hotter than hell
I come home from Nam worked my way to scarfer, a job that’d suit the devil as well
Taconite coke and limestone fed my children and made my pay
Them smokestacks reached like the arms of god into a beautiful sky of soot and clay

Here in Youngstown, here in Youngstown
My sweet Jenny I’m sinkin‘ down, here darlin‘ in Youngstown

Well my daddy come home from Ohio works when he came home from World War 2
Now the yard’s just scrap and scrubble
He said: „ Them big boys did what Hitler couldn’t do“
These mills they built the tanks and bombs that won these country’s wars
We sent our sons to Korea and Vietnam now we’re wonderin‘ what they were dyin’for

Here in Youngstown, here in Youngstown
My sweet Jenny I’m sinkin‘ down, here darlin‘ in Youngstown

From the Monongahela valley to the Mesabi iron range
To the coal mines of Appalachia the story’s always the same
Seven hundred tons of metal a day now sir you tell me the world’s changed
Once I made you rich enough rich enough to forget my name

And Youngstown, and Youngstown
My sweet Jenny I’m sinkin‘ down, here darlin‘ in Youngstown

When I die I don’t want no part of heaven, I would not do heaven’s work well
I pray the devil comes and takes me to stand in the fiery furnaces of hell