fireside book of favorite american songs

It's Thursday, so it's time for another "from our home library" vintage book post. This is one I just recently acquired after seeing it on Golden Gems. I was researching the illustrator Aurelius Battaglia and came across this one. I was so enchanted with the illustrations that I ordered it online. I had no idea what songs were in it, but was hoping for the best. If nothing else, I was going to tear it apart and frame the illustrations.

Fireside Book of Favorite American Songs Selected and Edited by Margaret Bradford Boni, Arranged for the Piano by Norman Lloyd, and Illustrated by Aurelius Battaglia

-published in 1952 by Simon and Schuster, Inc.

So, this is a songbook, and while I do know how to play the piano, I don't actually own a piano, so the sheet music is pretty much useless to me. But Juliet and I love singing together before bedtime from our collection of songbooks. (Imagine me as Maria in the Sound of Music and Juliet as little Gretta. It's exactly the same, except I can't sing. And I don't usually wear a dirndel.)

My dad used to sing folk songs to my brothers and me when we were kids, so I was hoping for some of those ones to appear in this book.

Here's an example of the illustrations I love so much.
Unfortunately, I am unfamiliar with most of the songs in the book, but I do know this one "Daisy Bell (A Bicycle Built for Two)."

More beautiful illustrations--this one is for the song "There'll Be a Hot Time". (Never heard of it, but sounds fun.)

Here's a sweet one for "The Little Lost Child." Underneath the title it reads "Child songs were in great demand during the middle 90's, and this "heart" story of the lost child, with its happy ending and ingratiating tune, became one of the big hits of the day."
Here's one for "Ida, Sweet as Apple Cider." I'd like to find out how this one goes.
Here's an illustration for "Jacob's Ladder." Finally! One I know!
And lastly, another of the few that I know "How Firm a Foundation" which is described as "a famous folk hymn, still found in many of our modern hymnals."

I like that. "Modern Hymnals." Do those two words even go together anymore? At any rate, I love this hymn and have enjoyed singing it with Juliet. Now I just need to figure out the rest of the songs in this book. It should keep up occupied for a long time to come.

Do you have any favorite songbooks to share? Any favorite folk songs?