“He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother” is a well-liked music ballad written by Bobby Scott and Bob Russell. Initially recorded by Kelly Gordon in 1969, the music turned a worldwide hit for The Hollies later that yr and once more for Neil Diamond in 1970. It has been coated by many artists in subsequent years. The Hollies’ and Rufus Wainwright’s variations of the music have been featured within the movie Zoolander.
Origin of the music
Scott and Russell had been launched to one another by Johnny Mercer, at a California nightclub. Though Russell was dying of lymphoma and the pair met in individual solely 3 times, they managed to collaborate on the music.
Origin of the title
In 1884, James Wells, Moderator of the United Free Church of Scotland, in his e book The Parables of Jesus tells the story of somewhat woman carrying an enormous child boy. Seeing her struggling, somebody requested if she wasn’t drained. With shock she replied, “No, he’s not heavy; he’s my brother.”
In a 1918 publication by Ralph Waldo Trine titled The Increased Powers of Thoughts and Spirit, he relates the next anecdote: “Have you learnt that incident in reference to the little Scottish woman? She was trudging alongside, carrying as greatest she might a boy youthful, but it surely appeared virtually as huge as she herself, when one remarked to her how heavy he have to be for her to hold, when immediately got here the reply: ‘He’s na heavy. He’s mi brither.’”[
The first editor of Kiwanis magazine, Roe Fulkerson, published a column in September 1924 carrying the title “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother”, the first use of the phrase exactly as it is rendered in the song title.
In the 1940s, the words, adapted as “He ain’t heavy, Father, he’s my brother”, were taken as a slogan for Boys Town children’s home by founder Father Edward Flanagan.
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