By James A. Bland
"Carry Me Back to Ole Virginny" was written by James
A. Bland. This is special music to the Lions in Virginia. The Lions Clubs of
Virginia sponsor a music contest for school students called the "Bland
Contest" in honor of James Bland.
The Annual Bland Music Scholarships Program was established in
1948 to assist and promote cultural and educational opportunities for the
musically talented youth of Virginia. The program consists of elimination
contests starting at club level and continuing through “State Final Contest.”
The program is open to any boy or girl, vocalist or instrumentalist, properly
sponsored by a Virginia Lions Club. Any resident of Virginia (or within the
club jurisdiction) and attending elementary, junior, or senior high school is
eligible to participate. Awards shall be furnished by the State Bland Committee
as follows:
Over $25,000 is awarded yearly in state, regional, district, and
local scholarships and cash awards. The total amount awarded can vary from year
to year. To obtain information on the awards or to participate in the Bland
Contest, please contact the Lion's Club in your area.
James A. "Jimmy" Bland, the greatest Black writer of
American Folk Song composed over seven hundred songs, a number of which were
outright contributions to Americana.
He was born October 12, 1854, at Flushing, Long Island, N.Y., a
free American, one of eight children. His family was from Charleston, South
Carolina. His father, Allan Bland, an alumnus of Wilberforce University, was
one of the first College Trained Blacks. He attended night classes and received
his law degree from Howard University, and was the first Black man to be
appointed examiner in the United States Patent Office.
Jimmy Bland, as a boy 12 years old and living in Philadelphia,
saw an old black man playing a Banjo and singing Black Spirituals. Jimmy was so
elated over this that he was determined to have his own Banjo. So he built a
crude imitation with old bailing wire for strings, but a larger kid picked a
fight with him and tore it up. His father bought Jimmy an eight-dollar Banjo.
Soon thereafter the family moved to Washington D.C.. Having taught himself to
play exceptionally well, Jimmy earned spending money by playing and singing in
the streets. By the time he was fourteen he had become professional and was
entertaining in hotels, restaurants and for private parties. At fifteen, he
started composing some short pieces of his own, but did not record any of them.
He finished high school in Washington and strummed and sang his
way partly through Howard University. At seventeen, he tried to put on a
musical show at Howard and was banned from the University. While at Howard
University, he met a girl, Mannie Friend, who was destined to help shape his
future life. Then he met Professor White, an old black man with snow white
hair, who recognized Bland's God Given musical talents and began teaching him
how to write songs and music. One night while playing and singing in Lafayette
Park to his girl friend Mannie, Mr. John Ford, owner of the Ford Theater, saw
him and offered to introduce Jimmy to George Primrose, one of the great
minstrel men of the time.
The introduction to Primrose was delayed by a trip to Mannie's
birthplace in Tidewater, Virginia, which was on Judge White's plantation on the
James River, between Charles City and Williamsburg. Here, while James Bland and
Mannie Friend were sitting on the bank of the James River, Jimmy composed
"Carry Me Back to Ole Virginny." Mannie wrote the words down for him
as he played and sang it. On returning to Washington, Mr. John Ford introduced
Jimmy Bland to George Primrose of Primrose and West. With his one song "Carry
Me Back To Ole Virginny," Jimmy, now age 19 made a big hit with Primrose
and Billy West and within a week they opened their new show in Baltimore.
Mr. Tom Harvey, owner of the then famous Harvey's Restaurant in
Washington, D.C., had Jimmy play and sing his composition "In The Evening
By The Moonlight" for the Canvas Back Club, now the Gridiron Club, that
met at his restaurant. President Cleveland and General Robert E. Lee were both
member and present for the affair. Bland, realizing the limitations of the
four-stringed Banjo, added a fifth string to the instrument and it became known
as the Bland Banjo.
In his middle twenties, Jimmy worked the minstrel shows and
eventually joined Colonel Jack Harvey's minstrel troupe and toured the United
States. In 1881, Bland's salary was $10,000.00 a year; the highest ever paid a
minstrel man. Then Bland and Harvey's minstrel went to Europe and became a
sensation overnight. Jimmy gave a command performance at Buckingham Palace
before Queen Victoria and the Prince of Wales.
When Harvey's show came back to the States, Bland stayed in
London. During the twenty years he lived abroad, he toured the continent
earning $12,000.00 a year. Up to this time, only three American composers had
made a dent in the German music conscience, John Philip Sousa, James A. Bland
and Stephen Foster. In 1901, he returned from Europe, penniless and broke, and
went back to Washington, D.C.
While abroad he had lived high and dressed well, probably why he
and his money soon parted company. Aided by friends, he tried to compose but
the old spirit was gone. Eventually, he did compose and write lyric for a
musical production called "The Sporting Girl" which had 18 songs in
it. After having sold the work for only $250.00, he gave up and returned to
Philadelphia, broke and in very poor health.
Bland died of tuberculosis on May 6,1911. He was buried in
Merion Cemetery near Philadelphia, with not even a death notice in the
newspaper to mark his passing. The once handsome, happy-go-lucky, good natured,
slight of build black man, with wavy hair, light complexion, and who was often
called, "The Worlds Greatest Minstrel Man", passed into oblivion.
Bland's body remained obscure in the little Merion Cemetery covered with weeds
until 1939, when the Lions of Virginia aided by Dr. J. Francis Cooke, editor of
Etude Magazine, found his unmarked grave.
Merion Cemetery Location and Directions
The entrance to the Merion Cemetery is at the corner of Rock
Hill Road and Bryn Mawr Avenue in Bala Cynwyd, PA, about 2 miles from the
Belmont exit of Interstate 76, and about 10 miles from Center City
Philadelphia. From I 76, turn south onto Belmont (Should you mistakenly go
north, you would be on Green Street going across a bridge.). At the second
traffic light, turn right onto Rock Hill Road. Rock Hill curves for about 3/4
of a mile and seems to end at a T-intersection with a traffic light. Turn left
at the light but be ready to make another right rather quickly. Follow Rock
Hill Road again, paralleling the cemetery until you reach the intersection with
Bryn Mawr Avenue. The cemetery entrance is on your right, and there is a
memorial plaque at the gate giving some information on James Bland. To get to
the gravesite, take the fork left once you enter the cemetery. It is a large
stone about 200 feet down the road on your left.