The hip-hop icon of Wu-Tang fame has teamed up with the ice cream brand Good Humor to re-imagine the signature “Turkey in the Straw” jingle played by ice cream trucks all over the country. Because as it turns out, the tune has a problematic past.
“Do you remember that ice cream jingle? Of course, we all know it,” RZA said in a promotional video for Good Humor, which is owned by Unilever. “I’m not going to play it right now, though, because we come to find out that it has racist roots.”
“Turkey in the Straw” originated from a traditional British tune brought to the American colonies by Scots-Irish immigrants, according to scholar Theodore R. Johnson in his 2014 article for NPR.
The original song has no racial undertones. But the melody to the “Turkey in the Straw” was used by minstrel show performers in blackface and set to very racist lyrics – and that is how it rose to prominence in the US, Johnson wrote. Ice cream parlors throughout the 1800’s commonly played minstrel songs, which were eventually turned into ice cream truck jingles.
“While these associations of “Turkey in the Straw” are not the only part of its legacy, it is undeniable that this melody conjures memories of its racist iterations,” Good Humor said in a statement.
Good Humor called on all ice cream truck drivers to stop playing “Turkey in the Straw,” and said the new jingle created by RZA will be made available to ice cream trucks across the country. The jingle will also be added to industry standard ice cream truck music boxes, the company said.
“Good Humor has not owned ice cream trucks since the 1970s, nor did we create “Turkey in the Straw” or any other jingles,” the company wrote in a statement.
“However, as a leader in the industry, and the creator of the original ice cream truck, we want to be part of the solution on this issue, particularly since we work closely with so many ice cream truck drivers across the country.”
Here’s something that’ll make it impossible to hear the ice cream truck song in the same way: The seemingly sweet and whimsical tune has a racist history.
Viola Davis just dropped that knowledge on Instagram via a TikTok video from @_vanillabee_ that breaks down the song's origins, and wow. "The more you know...🌈✨," the actress wrote in the caption.
In the TikTok, @_vanillabee_ talks about how the original title of the ice cream truck song is actually "N— Love A Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!" (The N-word is used in the title and lyrics.)
The TikTok also includes the actual song recording—and it’s as horrible as you’d imagine. Sample lyrics include, "For here, they're made with a half a pound of co'l. There's nothing like a watermelon for a hungry coon."
People were blown away in the comments of Viola’s post. "Wow! The more you know!!!!" Octavia Spencer wrote. Apparently, this isn't news to everyone, though. "Yep," said Lenny Kravitz.
What are the racist origins of the ice cream truck song?
The song was originally recorded by a man named Harry C. Browne and released in 1916, according to the Smithsonian. However, the song stole its melody from an early 19th century tune called "Turkey in the Straw," which is the song's more commonly known name now.
That original melody was brought to America's colonies by Scottish and Irish immigrants who settled along the Appalachian Trail. They added lyrics that mirrored what was happening in their lives, NPR reports.
In Browne's version, the lyrics changed to feature racist names for and stereotypes about Black people. Not only that, but the original art with the song featured racist stereotypes.
"Even the graphics for the song…had a big-lipped, black face African American doing a jig on it. And then in the video that Columbia Records released, it had a huge piece of watermelon and an African-American male enjoying the watermelon," @_vanillabee_ says. "It even went as far as to say that watermelon is the Black man’s ice cream."
Story continues
How did the song end up on ice cream trucks?
The song eventually became affiliated with ice cream, and later ice cream trucks, because ice cream parlors played popular minstrel songs of the time, NPR reported. Somehow, this one song became a favorite and is still played on many ice cream trucks today.
The tune's popularity in America and its association with ice cream trucks are the result of decades of racist songs.
The “ice cream song” – arguably the most iconic jingle of American childhood – has an incredibly racist past.
While the tune behind the song has a long history dating back to at least mid-19th century Ireland, its popularity in America and its association with ice cream trucks are the result of decades of racist songs.
The tune, most commonly known in the United States as “Turkey in the Straw,” was derived from the old Irish ballad “The Old Rose Tree.”
“Turkey in the Straw,” whose lyrics weren’t racist, subsequently got some racist reboots. The first was a version called “Zip Coon,” published in the 1820s or 1830s. It was one of many “coon songs” popular at the time in the United States and United Kingdom, up through the 1920s, that used minstrel caricatures of black people for “comedic” effect.
Library of CongressImage from “Zip Coon” sheet music depicting the blackface character.
These songs appeared over ragtime tunes and presented an image of black people as rural buffoons, given to acts of drunkenness and immorality. This image of black people had been popularized in the early minstrel shows of the 1800s.
“Zip Coon” was named after a blackface character by the same name. The character, first played by American singer George Washington Dixon in blackface, parodied free black man attempting to conform to white high society by dressing in fine clothes and using big words.
Zip Coon, and his countryfied counterpart Jim Crow, became some of the most popular blackface characters in the South after the end of the American Civil War, and his popularity spurred the popularity of this older song.
Then in 1916, American banjoist and songwriter Harry C. Browne put new words to the old tune and created another version called “N****r Love A Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!” And, unfortunately, the ice cream song was born.
The opening lines of the song begins with this racist call-and-response dialogue:
Browne: You n*****s quit throwin’ them bones and come down and get your ice cream!
Black men (incredulously): Ice Cream?
Browne: Yes, ice cream! Colored man’s ice cream: Watermelon!
Incredibly, the lyrics get worse from there.
Around the time Browne’s song came out, ice cream parlors of the day began playing minstrel songs for their customers.
JHU Sheridan Libraries/Gado/Getty ImagesAn American ice cream parlor, 1915.
As minstrel shows and “coon songs” died lost popularity during the 1920s, it seemed as though this racist aspect of American society had finally gone to pasture.
However, in the 1950s, as cars and trucks were becoming more affordable and popular, ice cream trucks emerged as a way for parlors to draw in more customers.
These new trucks needed a tune to alert customers that ice cream was coming, and many of these companies turned to minstrel songs for tunes that evoked a nostalgic past of turn-of-the-century ice cream parlors for a generation of white Americans. Thus, the ice cream songs of old were repurposed.
“Sambo-style caricatures appear on the covers of sheet music for the tune that were released into the era of the ice cream trucks,” noted writer Richard Parks in his article on the tune.
Sheridan Libraries/Levy/Gado/Getty ImagesSheet music cover image of ‘Turkey in the Straw A Rag-Time Fantasie’ by Otto Bonnell.
“Turkey in the Straw” is not alone among ice cream songs that were popularized or created as minstrel songs.
Other ice cream truck staples, like “Camptown Races,” “Oh! Susanna,” “Jimmy Crack Corn,” and “Dixie” were all created as blackface minstrel songs.
In this day and age, few associate the iconic “ice cream song” or these other ditties with the legacy of blackface and racism in the United States, but their origins reveal the extent to which American culture has been shaped by racist portrayals of African-Americans.
After learning about the truth behind the ice cream truck song, learn about the racist origins of America’s suburbs, and the story of the first black family to move in. Then, check out this article on the contentious history of the “Happy Birthday” song.