The Old Folks at Home

"Old Folks at Home"
Sheet music, 1851 edition
Song
Published	1851
Songwriter(s)	Stephen Foster

"Old Folks at Home" (also known as "Swanee River", "Swanee Ribber" [from the original lyrics], or "Suwannee River") is a minstrel song written by Stephen Foster in 1851. Since 1935 it has been the official state song of Florida, although in 2008 the original lyrics were expurgated.

According to Joel Whitburn's "Pop Memories 1890-1954" (1986), "Old Folks at Home" was the best-selling sheet music song of the period, with over twenty million copies sold.

"Old Folks at Home" in print was credited to E. P. Christy on early sheet music printings. Christy had paid Foster to be credited, which Foster himself had suggested but later came to regret.

Foster had composed most of the lyrics but was struggling to name the river of the opening line, and asked his brother to suggest one. The first suggestion was "Yazoo" (in Mississippi), which despite fitting the melody perfectly, was rejected by Foster. The second suggestion was "Pee Dee" (in South Carolina), to which Foster said, "Oh pshaw! I won't have that." His brother then consulted an atlas and called out "Suwannee!" Foster said, "That's it, exactly!" Adding it to the lyrics, he purposely misspelled it as "Swanee" to fit the melody.

Foster himself never saw the Suwannee—or even visited Florida—but the popularity of the song stimulated tourism to Florida, to see the river.

Antonín Dvořák's Humoresque No. 7, written in the 1890s, is musically similar and is sometimes played along with "Old Folks at Home." The Library of Congress's National Jukebox presents a version with soprano Alma Gluck and violinist Efrem Zimbalist, Sr.