5. The Accordion Dog

Notes: THE ACCORDION DOG was collected from a Berea College student in 1976 and has since been heard in Strasburg, Virginia and a couple of other places. My source did not liken the dog to an accordion—that is my invention. Two friends told me a “dirty” version, one from his childhood in Cherokee County, North Carolina in which the dog is in a car which wrecks and both dog and its owner end up in the hospital. The owner, when he comes to, sees the dog on the rug next to his bed and asks the doctor if that is his dog. The doctor answers in the affirmative to which the man says, “What’s that collar thing around his neck?” Is this the original tale?

See also Botkin, A Treasury of American Folklore, rev. ed., New York, Crown Publishers, 1975; “Fay Hubbard’s Dog” pp 511-512 from Idaho, A Guide in Word and Picture, Federal Writers’ Project, 1937.

Also, Fireman’s Fast Lane Hound, Crown Publishers, 1944, Chicago Dentist Folklore by Jack Conroy, Manuscript for WPA Federal Writers’ Project.