Home on the Range
Session Laws, 1947
pages 768-769
Chapter 433
KANSAS STATE SONG
House Bill 198
An Act establishing a Kansas state song.
WHEREAS, The words of the song "Home on the Range," originally entitled "My Western Home, " were written by Dr. Bewster Higley, a pioneer Kansas physician, in his cabin on Beaver creek near Smith Center in 1871 or 1872; and
WHEREAS, "My Western Home" as originally written consisted of six verses. Those most often used are the first and fifth. The second verse mentions the "banks of the Beaver" which refers to Beaver creek in Kansas and the "gale of the Solomon vale" which refers to the Solomon river valley in this state; and
WHEREAS, Dan Kelly, a local druggist and friend of Doctor Higley, composed the music to "My Western Home" at the request of mutual friends of Doctor Higley and Mr. Kelly; and
WHEREAS, Although "Home on the Range" has become known as a cowboy song, the phrase, "Home on the Range" does not appear at all in the original words. While "Home on the Range" has become more popular than "My Western Home," any examination of the changed version of the music or verses reveals it as the same; and
WHEREAS, The song, "Home on the Range" is as truly Kansas as the sunflower and the jayhawks and has grown to such immense poularity that admirers in other states have often tried to change the words to make them applicable to their locality: Now therefore,
Be it inacted by the Legislature of the State of Kansas:
SECTION 1. That the song, "Home on the Range" as originally written with the words by Dr. Brewster Higley and music by Dan Kelly is hereby established as the Kansas state song. The words to such song shall be:
Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam,
Where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the sky is not clouded all day.
Chorus:
A home, a home where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the sky is not clouded all day.
Oh, give me the gale of the Solomon vale,
Where life streams with buoyancy flow,
On the banks of the Beaver, where seldom if ever
Any poisonous herbage doth grow.
Oh, give me the land where the bright diamond sand
Throws its light from the glittering stream
Where glideth along the graceful white swan,
Like a maid in a heavenly dream.
I love the wild flowers in this bright land of ours;
I love too the wild curley's scream,
The bluffs and white rocks and antelope flocks
That graze on the hillsides so green.
How often at night, when the heavens are bright
With the light of the glittering stars,
Have I stood here amazed and asked as I gazed
If their glory exceeds this of ours.
The air is so pure, the breezes so free,
The zephyrs so balmy and light,
I would not exchange my home here to range
Forever in azure so bright.
(The official words can be found online at the Kansas Statutes website. There is no direct link. Click on the link below, "Kansas Statutes Online," and in the search box titled "Search by keyword or phrase" put in: home on the range, and click on the SEARCH button. Within the hit list that comes up click on the one that is titled: 73-1301.
SECTION 2. This act shall take effect and be in force from and after its publication in the statute book.
Approved April 8, 1947
RETURN TO Kansas 150 SLK blog