The Hog Song & The John Deere Polka
We occasionally receive anonymous letters, and some are quite good, but the editorial staff at the Record believes that people should own their opinions if they wish to voice them on the pages of our newspaper. So we have a policy against printing anonymous letters to the editor.
This week we received such a letter, handwritten on two sheets of a yellow notepad, questioning the musical taste of radio host and station owner Dan Mueller at KVLG-KBUK FM. This letter moved me so much that my editor, Jeff Wick, suggested that I write a column in response.
This anonymous writer states: “KVLG-KBUK is a very wonderful radio station as long as Dan Mueller doesn’t play those crazy songs, ‘The Hog Song’ and ‘The Tractor Song,’ that he played over 300 times last year. People are wondering … if he is losing his mind ... If he loves these songs so much, then why doesn’t he play them on Sunday morning on Songs of Hope. We all hope and pray he gets back on track and everything will be OK. Good luck, Dan.”
Concerning the Tractor Song. I believe the writer is referring to “The John Deere Polka.” I agree, it’s terrible and I could go without hearing it ever again. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge polka fan. And I love John Deere tractors. But just because I like Blue Bell and Shiner Bock doesn’t mean we should mix them together. This polka, like so many sung in English, comes across as silly, like something by Wierd Al Yankovic.
Please, Judge Mueller, give us something more soulful like “U Studanky” or “Okolo Mĕsíce” 300 times a year instead.
“The Hog Song,” as the listener referred to it, is actually titled “Who’s Gonna Feed Them Hogs?” by the great Tom T. Hall. If you don’t like this song when it comes on the radio, it doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with the DJ. It means there’s something wrong with you.
I don’t remember when I first heard this song. I grew up in Schulenburg listening to KVLG my whole life, so I was probably pretty young. I do remember the first time I really listened to the lyrics. It brought tears to my eyes and changed my whole outlook on life.
The man is lying in a hospital bed trying to figure out how to save his livelihood while everyone else is getting ready for him to die.
“Four hundred hogs, they just standin’ out there
My wife can’t feed ‘em and my neighbors don’t care
They can’t get out and roam around like my old huntin’ dogs
Here I am in this dang bed and who’s gonna feed them hogs?”
He’s not asking for a handout, he’s just trying to figure out how to feed them hogs. Then he thinks to himself,
“Four hundred hogs comes to eight hundred hams
And that’s a lot of money for a hog-raisin’ man
Four hundred hogs comes to sixteen hundred feet
The market’s up and there are people a-waitin’ on that meat”
To everyone’s amazement, the man puts on his overalls and walks out of the hospital. He’s gonna feed them hogs.
It’s a story of hope and determination, the power of mind over body, and how market forces (as in voluntary, consensual relations between people) might encourage us to pull ourselves up by the overall bib.
Keep on spinning that record, Judge Mueller. I could take it twice a day.
“That’s all there is to this small song but waitress, before you leave,
Would you bring me some coffee and a hot ham sandwich, please?”
Editor’s Note: This is a well-written column by Andy Behlen, but I do not agree with his interpretation of the end of the song. I always thought that the man’s miraculous recovery in the hospital was due, not to his determination to get back out there and feed “them hogs” as Andy believes, but rather the rancher sees the light at the end of the tunnel, after a life of hard farm work. He could sell all those hogs, forget the stress of having to feed them daily, which is what I always thought sent him to the hospital in the first place, and enjoy a relaxing retirement – ham sandwich in hand.
– Jeff Wick