"Yankee Doodle"
Why did yankee doodle stick a feather in his hat and call it macaroni? Back in Pre-Revolutionary America when the song "Yankee Doodle" was first popular, the singer was not referring to the pasta "macaroni" in the line that reads "stuck a feather in his hat and called it macaroni". "Macaroni" was a fancy ("dandy") style of Italian dress widely imitated in England at the time. So by just sticking a feather in his cap and calling himself a "Macaroni" (a "dandy"), Yankee Doodle was proudly proclaiming himself to be a country bumpkin, because that was how the English regarded most colonials at that time. But times have long since changed, and it is important to reflect on the fact that despite the turbulent early relationship between England and the American colonists, our two countries are strongly united.
Yankee doodle, keep it up, There was Captain Washington And then the feathers on his hat, And then we saw a swamping gun, And every time they shoot it off, I went as nigh to one myself, We saw a little barrel, too, And there they'd fife away like fun, The troopers, too, would gallop up Uncle Sam came there to change But I can't tell half I see Cousin Simon grew so bold, And there I saw a pumpkin shell, Yankee doodle, keep it up,
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