Exploring the sandhills countryside in search of something, I stepped into a white frame Lutheran church along the road and found, on a table in the entryway, for reason unknown, an old, slender booklet, unrelated to church business: Songs of Charlie and Cedric was the title. Never heard of them, but I took notes.
An inside photo depicts Charlie Onan, the elder in a musical duo, standing with guitar, and Cedric, the younger, seated with banjo, the two identified as “that popular father and son team heard over WDAY.” Both are attired in suits and ties. The little book is packed with song lyrics. All right, now I am intrigued.
It turns out they were farmers from over at Sabin, Minnesota, where Charlie’s father, who happened to be a fiddler, brought the family to take up a farm in 1883. They came from New York, and their surname is Scottish. Charlie, billed as the Old Timer, commenced playing live on the air for WDAY in 1923. Cedric joined him in 1927. The Old Timer did the banter. The younger Onan told the jokes.
At least by 1933 Charlie and Cedric were part of a larger assemblage billed as the WDAY Barn Dance which played gigs at the Avalon Ballroom, the Fargo Theatre, and other venues. The MC for such appearances was station program manager Ken Kennedy, who assumed the rustic persona of “Ole.” The clear template for the WDAY Barn Dance was the WLS Barn Dance, which went on the air from Chicago in 1924 and took up performing residence at the 8th Street Theater in 1931. The WDAY show did not broadcast from on-stage, those were live in-person performances. Charlie and Cedric also continued playing live on-air. Cedric played other live engagements around the area, sometimes with his son, sometimes featuring a female singer, Margaret Lawrence.
Unlike the WLS show and other imitators, the WDAY Barn Dance did not go full-on hillbilly or even ostentatiously country. Ole the MC was a figure of local color, and there were other rustic elements, mostly comic. Those suits and ties, however, belied any pose of bucolic naivete. In fact, Charlie served 54 years as Sunday school superintendent of Baker Westminster (Presbyterian) Church, did 45 years on the local school board, and was twice elected to the state legislature.
Now, back to that song booklet. The repertoire, while folksy, contains only a few traditional folk songs. “The Lane County Bachelor” is in there. Nor does it embrace hillbilly string music, except for some comic pieces, or appear assertively countrified. The repertoire is just, songs, music that people would know, for one reason or another. “There’s an Empty Cot in the Bunkhouse Tonight,” although a cowboy song, was a movie cowboy song.
Now wait, here’s a marker of interest: the song, "Red River Valley,” four verses plus chorus. And it is the chorus that fixes my interest.
Come and sit by my side if you love me,
Do not hasten to bid me adieu
But remember that Red River Valley
And the girl that has loved you so true.
There is longstanding popular disagreement as to whether this song originated in the Red River valley of the north or that of the south. The latter is a cowboy song, with the cowpoke mourning the departure of his sweetheart. The former, however, is a soldier-sweetheart song dating from the Métis Rebellion, with a Métis maiden singing to her soldier sweetheart who is leaving the valley. Sometimes gender matters, and in this case, Charlie and Cedric situate themselves in the Red River Valley of the North. Their lament is female. Their song belongs here.
