1

FL-1
February 15, 1939

J. B. and Birdie Lee Atkins (real names)
Municipal Trailer Camp
Tampa, Florida
Lindsay M. Bryan, writer

unedited

"JAYDY" ABBIN

FLORIDA ADVENTURER

On the ragged fringe of the trailer camp an aged and battered flivver
coughed and wheezed to a stop. It settled dejectedly in the sand, with flabby
tires and drooping fenders. Attached to its rear was a small homemade house
trailer, or more accurately, a rough tin ahanty on wheels.

Thedriver, an angular and weather-beaten man of perhaps 35, in faded
blue overalls, got out of the car and peered hare and there under its bottom.
Suddenly his long frame straightened up with alacrity. He shook a mop of
sandy hair out of his eyes, threw back his head, and gave lusty vent to the
peculiar, half-yodling "hoy-e-e-e-pee," yell of the Florida cowboy.

Then, gazing into far space, he sang off-key in a robust but adenoidal
tenor:

"I'm a-goin down to Tampa town
With money in muh britches,
A pint o' likker on each hip
Look out, you sons-o-witches!

"Fer I'm a wild-eyed fightin fool,
an um gonna raise some h—1.
I'm rootin, tootin, cuttin, shootin
Cowboy from La Belle."

The lilting ditty was sung to a tune something like that of "Dixie."

Intrigued by the picture and sound effects, the questing writer sniffed a
possible story and approached the scene. As he drew near a woman's voice
from inside the trailer quavered in mild rebuke of the singer: