MUSIC

20-year-old Bob Dylan's handwritten ode to Wisconsin hits the auction block

James B. Nelson
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Bob Dylan in "Bob Dylan: No Direction Home."

A handwritten ode to Wisconsin — with references to Milwaukee, Madison and Wauwatosa — penned by a 20-year-old Bob Dylan will be auctioned in Los Angeles on Thursday.

The sheet of paper, with writing on both sides, is billed as a "Draft Song About Wisconsin, Where Dylan Spent Summers as a Youth," by Nate. D. Sanders Auctions, which specializes in "fine autographs and memorabilia." Starting bid: $30,000.

The three-verse sheet carries this identifying information: "Bob Dylan/11-20-61/ NYC," according to the image on the auction house website.

The lyrics were penned less than a year after Dylan arrived in New York from Minnesota, and seven months after Dylan's first major gig, April 11, 1961, opening for John Lee Hooker at Gerde's Folk City in Greenwich Village. The now Nobel Prize winner Dylan was signed to Columbia Records in October 1961.

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Bob Dylan handwritten lyrics from November 1961, when Dylan was performing at clubs in New York, shortly after he signed with Columbia Records. Dylan pens a song about Wisconsin, where he lived in late 1960 before moving to New York, and also where he spent time as a teenager at summer camp. The lyrics were given by Dylan to Peter Crago, a musician with whom Dylan briefly lived in New York in 1961.

"Dylan pens a song about Wisconsin, where he lived in late 1960 before moving to New York, and also where he spent time as a teenager at summer camp," the auction house description of the item says. "The lyrics were given by Dylan to Peter Crago, a musician with whom Dylan briefly lived in New York in 1961."

The description notes: "Several words in the draft are crossed out and replaced, such as 'dreams' being crossed out and replaced with 'thoughts' in section 3."

There are also changes involving "Wauwatosa." In the first verse, Dylan made corrections around the original word and changed it to "Wowwowtoaster," so the line reads "I was in Wowwowtoaster there."

Dylan calls Wisconsin the "dairy state" and says it's "milk and cheese and cream." He says he's "going back to my hometown" with his banjo.

The sheet measures 8.5 inches by 10.75 inches and comes with a certificate of authenticity that describes the untitled lyrics as "unpublished." The top part of the page is "torn off, horizontal fold and light toning, otherwise near fine," the auction house states.

The auction house isn't sure what the piece will sell for, auction manager Michael Kirk said in a telephone interview.

"This is the most important Dylan item that we've ever had," Kirk said.

Interest could be high, as evidenced by the number of visits to the item on the auction house web page, he said. Other listings this month include a "desalination document" signed by Thomas Jefferson, a "John Lennon worn Beatles suit," and a letter signed by Sigmund Freud.

Kirk said the company is keeping private the name of the owner who is selling the Dylan piece, but added, "the lineage is directly from the Crago family."

The auction closes at 5 p.m. central time Thursday.

Here are complete, uncorrected lyrics as posted by the auction house:

''1. Wisconson is the dairy state
I guess you all know well
I was in Wow Wow Toaster there
The truth to you I'll tell
It's milk & cheese & cream
I've known 'em all my days
I'm going back to my hometown I'm leaving rightaways

2. I'm a heading out Wisconson ways
2000 miles to go
Madison, Milwakee set's my heart aglow
I'm a coming to that dairy state
My heart's a beating fast
I'll jerk my banjo gently there
And twiddle my mustache

3.There's thoughts I left there long ago
One a coming now it seems
I'll tune my banjo than the hills
And feast on milk and cream
And stamp my foot all thru the grass
And never know a care
My homes in Wow Wow Toaster
And I'm a going there''

The song continues on the verso:
''1. These people with you city ways
Are driving me insane to drink
My home's in Wisconson it's a better place I think
I've been in California
My home's in Wisconson
And I'm gonna own the town''