If you've come here for the answers to the puzzle about how many big band swing songs are referred to in the lyrics, here they are:
1st Verse - Jump,Jive, and Wail (Louis Prima).
3rd Verse - San Anotonio Rose (Bob Wills), In the Mood and Chatanooga Choo Choo (Glenn Miller). These three in the 3rd verse are also where the guitar accompaniment plays variations of their themes;
4th Verse - We're Off To See The Wizard and Zing! Went The Strings Of My Heart (Judy Garland), I Got Rhythm (Red Nichols), We're In The Money (Ted Lewis), Begin The Beguine (Artie Shaw), It's Only A Paper Moon (Paul Whiteman), Tangerine (Jimmy Dorsey);
5th Verse - One O'Clock Jump and My Little Grass Shack in Kealakekua Hawaii and Sing Sing Sing With A Swing (Benny Goodman); American Patrol (Glenn Miller); It Don't Mean A Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing (Duke Ellington)
Here's a photo of Seth with the St. Louis Blues facing Frank Mahovlich
  Whale of a Tale  In 1900 an eight year old Rossland boy was tried for murdering a Chinese cook who was working at their home. His name was Ernest Chenoweth and he lived with his mother Mary and two half brothers, Roy Stephens (19 years old) and Merton Stephens (17 years old) in a small shack on 3rd Ave., located very close to where the Gresley-Jones family home was built about 1905 and still stands. There was a tiny kitchen (about 7 feet by 9 feet), a dining room, a parlour where Mary slept and a bedroom where the three boys slept. Mary also had another son, Hugh Stephens (about 14 years old), who was not living at home. I've never been able to find out when they first came to Rossland, but her second husband, Mr. Chenoweth, left Rossland in the spring of 1899, abandoning Mary and the boys. They moved into the shack on 3rd Ave. in August of 1899. Roy and Merton were working in the mines. On either the 14th or the 21st of May, 1900 Mary hired Mah Lin (who had been in Rossland since about New Years) to cook breakfasts and suppers for $16 a month.
     On the 23rd of May, Mah Lin came to cook the evening meal. According to Ernest's own words he was "playing house with a tin pan, two cups, and some broken dishes" in the yard when Mah Lin came at about 4:30. At about 5:30 Mah Lin was discovered dead of a gunshot to the head. The inquest concluded he was shot by "person unknown", but Jack Ingram, the Rossland Chief of Police wouldn't leave it alone. Now Jack seems to have had something against Mary and her boys. He was quoted as saying that Mary "is no better than a prostitute and her 3 sons are very tough boys.", an odd comment considering Jack's questionable past. In any case he had Ernest pegged for it right from the start. The Chinese Benevolent Society was very interested in solving the case after the early public sentiment blaming the Chinese for the crime. Ingram advised them to hire Pinkerton's, which they did. So a Mr. Ahern from Pinkerton's came and after a couple of days decided that Ingram was right. On Sunday, 22 July, he and Mr. Raymer ( of the Rossland police force) went to the Allan Hotel were Mary worked and talked her into letting them take Ernest to the basement for " no more than half an hour" to interogate him. After 4 hours, during which time Mary was not allowed to see him, Mr Ahern obtained a confession and Ernest was arrested. Mr. Raymer was never actually present when Ernest confessed. He only was present at the end when Mr. Ahern dictated a confession and Ernest agreed with it.
 
Ernest Chenoweth's Confession:  " I was watching chickens for Mrs. Wright a little after four o'clock on May 23. I remember it was the day before the Queen's birthday. I saw Mah Lin, the Chinaman employed by my mother as cook enter the kitchen by the back door. I went in by the same door shortly afterwards and he was slicing potatoes. I said to Mah Lin, ' I killem you,' meaning I kill you. I left the kitchen and passed through the front room and into the bedroom and got over the bed which was in the southwest corner of the room, and took a 32-calibre Remington rifle which belonged to my brother Roy, which was standing in the corner of the room at the back of the bed, and left the bedroom and passed into the front room. Before going into the front room and while I was on the bed I raised the trigger and snapped it, then I went towards the Chinaman Mah Lin. I said, as I raised the gun and aimed at him: 'Now here you go John." I then pulled the trigger. I was standing near the door of the kitchen. He smiled as I said " Here you go." He had a dish of beans in his hand. I pulled the trigger and he fell towards me, his head towards the front room door. He kicked around, and there was blood running from his mouth and nose. He did not speak, but made a gurgling sound. Then I put the gun back where I found it, and then went to the kitchen and said: " Did I kill you, John; did I kill you?" I then ran out the back kitchen door and went down towards the depot, and met Johnnie Perry there at the depot. I then went down Lincoln street, and met my mother and Mrs. King coming up from town. I did not tell her I killed Mah Lin, but I killed him. I didn't want to tell her for fear she would whip me. I told my mother about it before the inquest in court. She told me not to say anything about it. She was the only person I told of having killed him. I put the gun back in the corner again after I shot him. I was standing in the dining room when I shot him.

QUESTION:  Was you much scared when you shot him?

ANSWER:  No, not much. I was glad one Chinaman was out of the way. I was afraid of the Chinaman for fear they would kill me. That was the reason I didn't tell the truth at the investigation. He smiled when I pointed the gun at him, but the smile left his face mighty quick when I shot him.

Acknowledged before me on July 22, 1900.

(Signed) Edward Bowes (Coroner)
(Signed) Ernest Chenoweth
(Signed) F. E. French     (Signed) Dan McDougall (witnesses)

**********
 
     In August they took Ernest to jail in Nelson to await trial in late October. Mary went on the train every day to visit him. The train would leave early in the morning and return in the evening, about 12 hours later. The trial became very political, with the provincial government courting the Chinese vote at the coast for the upcoming election. The Deputy Attorney-General himself came up to prosecute the case. The confession was never heard in court since it had been obtained under some measure a duress and an assurance by Mr. Ahern to Ernest that he would never be prosecuted for it. Also the defence was never given the opportunity to cross examine Mr. Ahern since he was never brought back for the trial (and since he was the only one who actually witnessed the original confession). The jury did hear from some city workers who Ernest had bragged to about the killing, saying "I never saw a son-of-a-bitch die as quick as the Chinaman".
     In any case the jury put their heads together for a few minutes wihout leaving the jury box and acquitted Ernest. He remains to this day the youngest person in Canada ever to stand trial for a capital crime.
     I don't know how long Ernest remained in Rossland, but by 1925 he was registered in Chico, Shasta County, California as a member of the Socialist Party. Roy Stephens was the last relative of Ernest's living in Rossland. Alfie still has a postcard that Roy and Margaret sent him on one of their visits to Chico. Whale of a Tale  The lyric above pretty much tells the story except to say that it's unlikely Bunny poisoned her husband. There was testimony given at the trial that James was taking much more arsenic and strychnine than his doctor was prescribing. There was also testimony given that it was impossible to extract enough arsenic from flypaper to kill a man. It seems that Alice Yapp's meddling stirred up a hornet's nest. It's my belief that the phrase "to shut your yap" or to "be yappy" came from this story. I have no real evidence to support this, but it was such a huge story at the time in Europe and North America that it seems like too much of a coincidence not to be the case.
     As for the Jack the Ripper connection, all the suspects have their supporters, and those that support James as being the one say that his diary has never been proven to be a hoax.
     And as for Jimmy Fuller, it seems he came full circle from his father's fate to his own. Whale of a Tale  That's Jack McDonald in the photo at the console of the Wurlitzer pipe organ at Vancouver's Orpheum Theatre in 1935, while he was getting his degree at UBC. The organ music at the end of the song was recorded in 1948 at the Capitol Theatre (Jack actually worked evenings during his university years for Famous Players who owned both theatres) by Don Hings (who holds the patent on the walkie-talkie). It was Christmas time and Jack and Don were alone in the theatre. Having played both organs for years, Jack considered the Capitol installation superior. The consoles were identical but in the Orpheum, because of the elaborate ceiling the pipes were installed in the walls. In the Capitol, on the other hand, they were installed in the ceiling, which gave it a much better sound. The Orpheum of course was extensively renovated and preserved at some point. The Capitol is gone but it's organ was still living in a basement in Burnaby.
     The dialogue at the beginning of the song is a converstaion between Jack and Berva, recorded in 1964. They had just got their first Channel Master tape recorder and were playing around with it before starting on their quest of preserving folks' voices and stories for posterity.