I grew up in Western Pennsylvania and as a child in the '60's learned the song from my father who sang it to/with me whenever we traveled. In the version I learned, the goat's owner was a gentleman named Bill Grogan and it went like this (I shall not bother with the repetition, you know it's there).
There was a man,
now please take note,
there was a man
who had a goat.
He loved that goat,
oh, yes he did,
he loved that goat
just like a kid!
One day that goat
while feeling fine
ate three red shirts
from off the line.
When Bill found out
what he had done
He said "Old goat,
your time has come!"
He took a stick,
gave him a whack,
then tied him to
the railroad tracks.
The whistle blew,
The train grew nigh!
Bill Grogan's goat
Was doomed to die!
He gave three groans
of mortal pain,
coughed up the shirts
and flagged the train!
Now, that much I can remember and/or reconstruct from all of your memories. The verses concerning the goat dying anyway and going to meet Saint Peter are vaguely familiar (I think that I, too, took secret pleasure from using the word "hell"), but sometime early on my father must have dropped those verses as inappropriate and allowed them to slip from memory. Probably my mother had a part in that...
We never sang a chorus to the song.
|
