Ry Cooder - JESSE JAMES (Another version) lyrics

(Neil Morris)

I'll tell you about Jesse and Frank James

My grandfather was personally acquainted with them

My grandfather lived in the southern edge of Baxter County, Arkansas

And they stayed all night with him lots of nights

And my grandfather told me there was a lot of those robberies that was layed to Jesse and Frank James

And he knew they didn't do it 'cause they was at his place when it happened

But you couldn't tell the public that

When they get their minds made up that somebody's done something

Why the public's gonna stick to it anyway

My grandfather, he knew them as boys

And they could come to his place and go without anybody paying attention 'cause nobody expected them

Down in Arkansas, see, 'cause they was from Missouri

Now that's the story that my grandfather told me when I was just a boy

And he said that Frank James, at that World's Fair,

I think it was 1901 in St. Louis him and Jesse were both there

My grandfather and Frank James were together there

And that Frank James offered to bring Jesse there alive

He said that the man that the Ford boys killed wasn't Jesse James at all

But the fellow they killed was just about the size of Jesse and he was red headed

And he wasn't any relation to the Fords

See, Jesse James was a known cousin to Charles and Bob Ford

That's what my grandfather said

He said Jesse and Frank were not even in that part of the country when that fellow was killed

And the Ford boys, why, they collected a thousand dollars for killing Jesse James!

Now the song says that the Ford boys killed Jesse

None of us up here in the mountains believe that, no sir!