came from irony-deficient yuppienscum.nPersonally, I think the remark aboutn”a hipper crowd” was the most perfectlynwrongest thing Barr could have said.nBut overall, I found her press conferencengratifying. By making plain thatnshe really doesn’t know any better (ifnpeople tune in your ironic TV shownand buy tickets to your ironic comedynact, why wouldn’t they enjoy yournironic rendition of the national anthem?),nshe thereby made plain, for allnwho somehow have missed it, thendifference between Roseanne Barr andnthe women she supposedly symbolizes.nAnd there was still more to comenLater, her husband turned up onnCrossfire and loudly labeled as “sexist”nthe idea that men can grab theirncrotches and spit but women can’t.n”Women can do that stuff too, pal!” henshouted in support of his wife, and Inlaughed so hard I woke up the cat.nWhen she sang the national anthemnon that memorable evening in July,nRoseanne Barr went one-on-one withnthe big American entertainment machinenand she lost. She also struck hernfirst and only blow for working-classnwomen by freeing them from the criticallynimposed working-class role modelnof Roseanne Barr. Behind every celebrityncloud there’s a silver lining. As fornthe heavy thinkers who helped crownnher Blue-Collar Queen, they’re nownstuck with her, so let ’em squirm.nMichael Kinsley, for instance, discoI’erednwhat can happen when you writenserious political commentary about anwoman who excels at snot jokes: younjust might end up — you want irony?n— hosting her husband on Crossfire.nAnd what a show that was. Uponnhearing Barr’s husband defend, with allnthe intelligence of a radish, an ideanabout female scratching and spittingnthat had all the intellectual weight ofn(yes!) a Cheeto, Michael Kinsley, thenman often described as having “thenbest mind in Washington,” the punditnwho, only a week earlier, had writtennthat the popularity of Roseanne is “andirect challenge” to the RepublicannParty — that Michael Kinsley — got anlook on his face of such pain, suchnhumiliation, such defeat that . . . well,nthe cat woke up again.nJanet Scott Barlow covers popularnculture from Cincinnati.nMUSICnThe Theft^ of annAmerican Classicnby Theodore PappasnCountry music has never beennshirked in the pages of Chronicles,nas any faithful reader knows. JohnnReed’s June column concerning thenFar East’s fascination with country music,nhowever, left out one pertinentnmention: the story of Torn Mitsui.nMr. Mitsui is a fifty-year-old professornof English at Kanazawa University;nhe is also Japan’s foremost scholar onncountry music. In 1967 he wrote whatnsome have called the first scholarlynstudy of bluegrass, BurugurasunOngaku {Bluegrass Music), and hisn1971 Kantori Ongaku no Rekishi (AnHistory of Country Music), twice reprinted,nis the Japanese equivalent ofnBill Monroe’s standard. Country Music,nU.S.A. He has even compiled anneleven-album set of re-recordings ofn”hillbilly arrists” for Japanese Victor,nwhich includes songs by Tex Ritter, thenCarter Family, and the Sons of thenPioneers, as well as rare recordings bynsuch performers as Riley Puckett, thenblind virtuoso of the banjo who isncredited with the first recording ofnyodeling. Mr. Mitsui has also travelednwidely in the United States, principallynfor reasons of general research. Hisn1989 visit, however, had a specificnpurpose. He sought the origin andnauthor of America’s most famous folknsong, the one George Jones oncencalled the most perfect song ever written,nthe one widely considered to bennnthe third best-known song (right aftern”Happy Birthday” and “White Christmas”)nin the wodd: “You Are MynSunshine.”nMr. Mitsui first went to the office ofnGeorgia State University professornWayne Daniel, who has long researchednthe history of Americanncountry music. Professor Daniel concludednin a 1984 article that the originnof the song would probably never benascertained, a conclusion he repeats innhis latest book, Pickin’ on Peachtree: AnHistory of Country Music in Atlanta,nCeorgia (University of Illinois Press,n1990): “So like some of the worksnascribed to Shakespeare, the authorshipnof ‘You Are My Sunshine’ probablynwill never be decided to everyone’snsatisfaction.”nA familiar story of the song’s originngoes like this. The song was first recordednby the Pine Ridge Boys onnAugust 22, 1939; the Rice BrothersnGang recorded it on September 13,n1939; country music star and formernLouisiana governor Jimmie Davis,nalong with one Charlie Mitchell,nbought the “rights” to the song fromnPaul Rice for $35 in late 1939; JimmienDavis published it, with “words andnmusic by Jimmie Davis and CharlesnMitchell,” with the Southern MusicnPublishing Company of New York onnJanuary 30, 1940, and recorded it ohnFebruary 5, that being the recordingnmost country music fans remembernand the one that placed the songnamong the top five country musicnrecordings of that year. Gene Autrynand Bing Crosby then made separatenrecordings of the song in 1941, solidifyingnits status as an American classic.nAccording to Professor Daniel, neithernthe Pine Ridge Boys nor Jimmie Davisnever claimed to have written “You ArenMy Sunshine,” but not so with PaulnRice; he claimed to have composed itnin 1937.nThere are still people alive, however,nwho remember hearing the song longnbefore 1937 — in particular, a mid-n193 O’s performance of’ the song bynRiley Puckett himself—and whatnthese people remember is the name ofnthe musician with whom both RileynPuckett and Paul Rice played in thenearly 1930’s: Oliver Hood of La-nGrange, Georgia.nOliver Hood was a soft-spoken, selftaughtnman of simple pleasures andnNOVEMBER 1990/49n