Tom: C
C F C F C F C F
[Verse 1]
C F
They came from Scandinavia, the land of midnight sun,
C Am
And crossed the North Atlantic when this century was young.
F
They'd heard that in America every man was free
F C F G C F C
To live the way he chose to live and be who he could be.
[Verse 2]
C F
Some of them were farmers there and tilled the frozen soil.
C Am
But all they got was poverty for all their earnest toil.
F C F
They say one was a sailor who sailed the wide world round,
C F G C F C F C F C F
Made home port, got drunk one night, walked off the pier and drowned.
[Verse 3]
C F
My mother was of Scottish blood, it's there that she was born.
C Am
They brought her to America in 1924.
F Am F Am F
They left behind the highlands and the heather-covered hills
Am F G C F C
And came to find America with broad expectant dreams and iron wills.
[Verse 4]
C F
My granddad worked the steel mills of central Illinois.
C Am
His daughter was his jewel, his son was just his boy.
F
For thirty years he worked the mills and stoked the coke-fed fires
G C F C
And looked toward the day when he'd at last turn 65 and could retire.
[Chorus]
Em Am
And the sons become the fathers and their daughters will be wives
F
As the torch is passed from hand to hand
C G
And we struggle through our lives.
Em Am G Am Am7
Though the generations wander, the lineage survives,
F Am F Am G C
And all of us, from dust to dust, we all become forefathers by and by.
[Interlude]
C F C F C F C F C F C F C F
[Verse 5]
C F
The woman and the man were wed just after the war
C Am
And they settled in this river town and three fine sons she bore.
F
One became a lawyer and one fine pictures drew
F Am F Am F
And one became this lonely soul who sits here now
G C
And sings this song to you.
[Chorus]
Em Am
And the sons become the fathers and their daughters will be wives
F
As the torch is passed from hand to hand
C G
And we struggle through our lives.
Em Am G Am Am7
Though the generations wander, the lineage survives,
F Am F G C F C F
And all of us, from dust to dust, we all become forefathers by and by.
C F C F
By and by...
C F C F
By and by...
