The Boston Tea Party |
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Swingin’ George the Third was the King of England. He one of them kind a cats that's ballin' up a breeze all the time, you see what I mean? Them court chicks was real pretty, and the music was jumpin', and the juice was flyin', and King George, Swingin' George the Third, he the kind a cat say, he say, He was that way, you see what I mean? George wanted everybody to have a good time. And he got swingin' so hard, and so solid, and so wild, and so stormy, that he done run out of loot. And when he started to run out of loot, man, and he started to look around, They havin’ a peaceful and prosperous life, the colony cats, you see. They's carryin' on cool and fine over there, you see. They wanted to decide what should be taxed. If they gonna put it down they want to know what they gonna put it down on. They laid a little sayin' said, That was the watchword, you see what I mean. And the Stamp Cats hired by Swingin' George, cut out because they didn't dig the drag that the colony cats was puttin' on them. Now there's a cat by the name 'a Sammy Adams, he was a real swingin' cat. He's the kingpin in Massachussetts. He set up a meetin' in New York City for all the colonists to protest. Want to put down this bad tax jazz, didn't dig it no way. He also arranged to have an underground Western Union goin' between the colony cats, you see what I mean. And this real swingin' cat, this stud by the name of Pat Henry, he was a goin' man. He was with it, he was down with it, and couldn't quit it. He was a big shot in the South, South Virginia. He said Well, he got many kudos and babbles for that bit. Now there's another cat by the name of Benny Franklin. He was a wailin' cat, he was with it all the time. He was sent to England to protest cause he’s a court cat, you know what I mean. He come on real strong. This - here come Benny the Frank. And Benny the Frank with it all the way. He done spied it out, had rings on the fingers, and jumpin'and goin', and he, he swung Philadelphia. He had the streets paved, and he lit them up, and improved the fuzz force, and the fire cats, and founded the U. P., an started the first library, and published the Penn Gazzette and Poor Richard's Almanac that was filled with jazz like: Cool! Now, Benny Franklin, like I say, he's a cat has lots of saying, you know, he wailin' all the time, he wanted to build some solid swing between England and America. And he went to Parliament every day to try to hip the cats to call off the stamps. Well, the British merchant men, they was complaining because business was bad. The American cats weren't buyin' nothin' due to this and Benny's put down. George let up, done rang the bell, called in the call and re-pealed the tax. Now when the cats in America done got hip to this, they flipped! They build bonfires, bells rang, flags went up, and everybody danced and got juiced. Some time went by again, and George got short a loot. He's puttin' on "Swingin'" George, you know, if you're a swingin' king, you've got to swing, all the kings swing anyway, but George is swingin' completely out of this world. He done run short a loot. And he decided to stamp them cats again. He say, Well, when the cats heard about this, they jumped salty all over the place. There's riots, and the Red Coats and the Pink Coats, and all that jazz, and the American the cats were laid out stiff and stark before Captain Pressmen of the British Royoul Guards cooled the situlation. Now George, "Swingin'" George the Third, he's got his ear to the wire. He hear about all this jazz. He decided to repeal the tax once more . He ain't going tax them for the coffee, but he going put the stomp on the tea. Well, the colony cats were overjoyed, but they didn't dig the tea situlation. Being all former English cats they dug the tea and they wouldn't buy or drink it cause they wanted to put George down for stompin' the tax on it. Now the East "Swingin'" India Company, who was handlin' shippin' the tea to America, was flippin' 'cause they couldn't push the tea onto the colony cats. Bankruptcy was in sight. The East India Company cut the price of tea, but the colony cats still refused to deal. The colony cats were flippin' inside, they really dug the tea. They're wiggin' to the extent of goin' out into the country looking for a substitute. They found one. It's consistin' of a mixture of dried up leaves, raspberry bushes, and some ground-up herbs. It came close, but they still pined for the mother tea. Now the Peggy Stuart was among the many ships that left England bound for America with her cargo holds bulgin' with Orange Pekoe. When she arrived at Annapolis, MD, a bunch of the studs held a meetin' and decided that due to the tax that was still on the tea they weren't a gonna allow the tea to land, and the populace wigged harder then that. They decided to burn the cargo and the ship. But before they got there the owner of the ship, Mister Anthony Stuart, the cat that was the captain, he got so real nervous and goofed off because he couldn't stick his head out of a port hole without some cat, boom, wangin' him with a gun. He got so nervous and so upset and so unsettled and so shook he done burned his own ship with the tea and all! Hee, hee! But the Dartmouth, that's another ship that George, that "Swingin" George, like I say, he's sendin' them ships out all the time, you see what I mean, arrived in Boston Harbor early Sunday, November the twenty-eighth, 1773, and two days later, the Eleanor and the Beaver arrived, that's two more swingin' ships, loaded with the tender leaf. Well the English taxers refuse to let the ships out 'til they dump the cargoes. The colony cats tried every which way to send the ships back. As a final ultimatum they gave the captain twenty days to split, or else. Well, Sammy Adams, like I 'splained to you, a real hard, swingin',cat, held a meetin' at the end of these twenty days at the Old South Church in Boston. He got up and he spoke ten words, which were: Just as he finished some cat in the rear of the church got up in his seat, blew a chorus of "Redwing" in B flat, and about fifty cats boom boodely, boom bah, boom boodely bum bum, buddly, bum bum bee, bee um ba all dressed up in grease paint and feathers got up and started jumpin', and swingin', and whoopin', and just then another cat jumps up and does a chorus of "Boston Harbor is Gonna be a Swingin' Teapot Tonight!" Then another cat hollers out, And fifty Indian studs cut out for the docks with the populace right behind 'em. They boarded the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, and the Beaver, and proceeded to rip open the hatches with their hatchets. And these cats wailed for three hours. And in three hours they made thirty thousand tea balls out of three hundred chests of tea, but cooled the issue. Now you get hip with history and no cat can cross you, because I'm going straighten you all the way. Got it? Solid! From "Hipsters, Flipsters, and Finger Poppin' Daddies" transcribed by Michael Monteleone |
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