My driftin' mem'ry goes back to the spring of '43

When I was just a child in mama's arms My daddy plowed the ground and prayed that some day we could leave

This run down mortgaged Oklahoma farm And then one night I heard my daddy sayin' to my mama

That he finally saved enough for us to go California was his dream a paradise for he had seen

Lots of pretty girls in magazines that told him so

California cottonfields

Where labor camps were filled with varied man with broken dreams

California cottonfields as close to wealth as daddy ever came

Well, almost everything we had was sold or left behind

From daddy's plow to the fruit that mama canned

Some folks came to say farewell and see what all we had to sell

Some just came to shake my daddy's hand

Well, the Model A was loaded down and California bound

And a change of luck was just four days away

But the only change that I remember seeing for my daddy

Was when his dark hair turned to silver-grey

California cottonfields

Where labor camps were filled with varied man with broken dreams

California cottonfields as close to wealth as daddy ever came