That Silver Haired Daddy of Mine

Gene Autry wrote a song in 1932 entitled “That Silver Haired Daddy of Mine.” The first time I heard it was about twenty years ago, shortly after my own father died, when I happened to be wandering around an old antiques shop in Massachusetts near where he was born. The shop was playing it as background music but it had a great effect on me at the time and I've often thought of it since then.

Many singers have covered it. Marty Robbins' version, below, has been one of the most popular and is worth hearing, although I myself am partial to Mac Wiseman's version. Wiseman has done some Romantic things that seem simply incomparable to me.

Hank Snow, the Canadian singer, wrote a sequel to it, in which he has the father responding to the regret by saying “Just come see me.”
                                    

Now, it goes through my mind that the versions of this old Gene Autry song are not as well known or respectable as, say, the parable of the Prodigal Son or Rembrandt's painting of the silver-haired, old father embracing the repentant son, but that they are working on the same thing. Old, popular classics often carry the mythic with them.

In a vine covered shack in the mountains
Bravely fighting the battle of time
There's a dear one who's weathered life's sorrows
It's that silver haired daddy of mine.

If I could recall all the heartaches
Dear old daddy, I've caused you to bear
If I could erase those lines from your face
And bring back the gold top your hair.

If God would but grant me the power
Just to turn back the pages of time
I'd give all I own if I could but atone
To that silver haired daddy of mine.

I know it's too late, dear old Daddy
To repay for the sorrows and cares
Tho’ dear Mother is waiting in Heaven
Just to comfort and solace you there.