VOICE: SONG:

I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier,
I brought him up to be my pride and joy.
Who dares to place a musket on his shoulder,
To shoot some other mother's darling boy?

NARRATOR: The most popular song in America in the spring of 1915 was “I Didn’t Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier.” 700,000 copies – on 78 r.p.m. records, and as sheet music—flew out of stores.  It was sung in bars and dance-halls, in concerts, schools, and in homes all across the country. 

RICHARD RUBIN:  This was a time, remember, when in a city like New York, there were a great many daily newspapers being published. But an awful lot of the population didn’t read or didn’t read English. And they got their news from songs. You would go to your local saloon after work and there’d be somebody there playing a piano, singing a song about something that had just happened in the news. Songwriters would pick up a few newspapers on their way into the office in the morning. They would read stories and they would sit down and write a couple of songs about them before lunch. They’d be published by the end of the day and for sale on the street.

VOICE: SONG: 

Ten million soldiers to the war have gone,
Who may never return again.
Ten million mothers' hearts must break,
For the ones who died in vain.

NARRATOR: America’s songwriting Mecca was a short stretch of West 28th Street in Manhattan. Known as Tin Pan Alley, it was home to one of the biggest industries in the country.  Sitting around their upright pianos, songwriting duos were acutely conscious of the national mood. 

RUBIN: “I didn’t raise my boy to be a soldier” was a mother’s plea for neutrality, it wasn’t just a catchy tune, it was what people were feeling.

VOICE: SONG:

There'd be no war today, if mothers all would say,
“I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier.”