"I'm a Tool Pusher from Snyder": Slim Willet's Oil Patch Songs

Slim Willet (born Winston Lee Moore) in action, 1953. From the author's collection. "Fm a ToolPusherfrom Snyder' Slim Willet's OilPatch Songs ByJoe W. Specht* Folklorist Mody Boatright, writing in ig63, commented on the dearth of folksongs about the petroleum industry: 'There was some singing in the oil fields and attempts were made to compose songs about oil field people and their work, but none of the efforts was of sufficient appeal to attain more than brief and local distribution."1 Bill Malone, the dean of country music historians, concurred, "almost none [oil songs] emerged from the culture ofoil work."2And Elmer Kelton, the award-winning Western novelistwho grew up outside ofCrane, Texas, during the town's oil boom days of the late ig20s, confessed, "When I think of the oil patch, I don't think ofmusic."3 Boatright mentioned several factors that help to explain the sparsity of spontaneous songs flowing from the oil field. First, the transitory nature of the work meant "a sense of community" was absent because crews seldom stayed together for extended periods of time.4 When compared to 'Joe W. Specht is Collection Manager of the Grady McWhiney Research Foundation in Abilene. This paper was originally presented, in different form, at the annual meeting of the Texas State Historical Association held in Austin on March 27, 200g. A tip ofthe hat to those who provided input and assistance along the way: Shelia Barrow, Ross Burns, Bruce Campbell, Earl Carmack, Francine Carraro, David Coffey, Kevin Coffey, Scott Downing, Curtis Hagen, Mike Hammack, Diana Davids Hinton, Melody Kelly, Elmer Kelton, Anita Lane, Teresa M. Latzel,Jimmie Moore,Jody Nix, Buddy Parman,Jack Pierce, Mike Pierce, Nolan Porterfield, Lou Rodenberger, Gary Shanafelt, Tyler Smith, Alice Specht, Mary Helen Specht, Cole Thompson, Bobby Weaver, Ken Wilson, and Terry Young. 1 Mody C. Boatright, Folklore of the Oil Industry (Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press, 1963), 155· * Bill C. Malone, Country Music U.S.A. (2nd rev. ed.; Austin: University ofTexas Press, 2002), 502. ' Elmer Kelton, conversation with the author, Dec. 1, 2007. Except for a short-term summerjob on a tanking crew, Kelton never worked in the oil fields, but he has provided compelling descriptions of how the discovery ofoil in the late 1920s affected daily life in Crane, Texas. See his foreword in Estha Briscoe Stowe, Oil Field Child (Fort Worth: Texas Chrisdan University Press, 1989); the prologue and audior's notes in Elmer Kelton, Honor at Daybreak (Fort Wordi: TCU Press, 2002); the chapter "Oil Boom Days in West Texas" in Elmer Kelton, My Kind ofHeroes (Abilene, Tex: State House Press, 2004); and Chapter Five in Elmer Kelton, Sandhills Boy: The Winding Trail ofa Texas Writer (New York: Forge, 2007). 4 Boatright, Folklore ofthe Oil Industry, 155. Boatright included a chapter, "Song and Verse," in Folklore Vol. CXIII, No. 3 Southwestern Historical Quarterly January 2010 2g4Southwestern Historical QuarterlyJanuary the romance of the range with rider on horseback serenading the herd, life on the rig was dirty, difficult, and dangerous, requiring total concentration to prevent serious injury or even death. And then there was the almost-constant noise of the drilling operation itself, which did litde "to encourage conversation, much less singing."5 It is certainly true, then, that a body of traditional song passed down aurally did not flourish in the oil patch as it did on the cow trail or in the coal mine.6 Still, in 185g when Edwin L. Drake successfully drilled for oil in northwestern Pennsylvania, professional songwriters and sheet music publishers responded with their own brand ofoil fever odes.7 If oil field workers were tightlipped when it came to singing about themselves, many petroleum-related songs—musical narratives that speak to life in the oil field as well as the continuing social and economic impact of the industry itself—nevertheless reside comfortably within the realm of commercially recorded music, especially as waxed by performers with roots in the Southwest.8 One need look no further than Slim Willet, perhaps best remembered as the composer of the ig52 bestseller "Don't Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes," to find a cache ofoil field songs vividly depicting life in the oil...