Dan Fogelberg – Forefathers (Guitar)

      C                           F
They came from Scandinavia, the land of midnight sun,

     C                                    Am 
And crossed the North Atlantic when this century was young.

         F
They'd heard that in America every man was free 

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To live the way he chose to live and be who he could be.

C                                     F
Some of them were farmers there and tilled the frozen soil. 

     C                           Am
But all they got was poverty for all their earnest toil. 

      F                    C   F
They say one was a sailor who sailed the wide world round, 

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Made home port, got drunk one night, walked off the pier and drowned.

    C                                  F
My mother was of Scottish blood, it's there that she was born.

      C                        Am 
They brought her to America in 1924. 

      F           Am   F        Am      F
They left behind the highlands and the heather-covered hills 

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And came to find America with broad expectant dreams and iron wills.

    C                                  F
My granddad worked the steel mills of central Illinois.

      C                         Am
His daughter was his jewel, his son was just his boy. 

      F
For thirty years he worked the mills and stoked the coke-fed fires 

                                        G                       C   F   C
And looked toward the day when he'd at last turn 65 and could retire. 

         Em                                       Am
And the sons become the fathers and their daughters will be wives 

         F
As the torch is passed from hand to hand 

         C                    G
And we struggle through our lives.

             Em                    Am   G      Am   Am7
Though the generations wander, the lineage survives,

     F          Am   F            Am  G                            C
And all of us, from dust to dust, we all become forefathers by and by.

     C                          F
The woman and the man were wed just after the war 

          C                              Am 
And they settled in this river town and three fine sons she bore.

 F
One became a lawyer and one fine pictures drew

     F          Am   F          Am   F
And one became this lonely soul who sits here now 

     G                  C
And sings this song to you.

         Em                                       Am
And the sons become the fathers and their daughters will be wives 

         F
As the torch is passed from hand to hand 

         C                    G
And we struggle through our lives.

             Em                    Am   G      Am   Am7
Though the generations wander, the lineage survives,

     F          Am   F                G                            C F  C F
And all of us, from dust to dust, we all become forefathers by and by.  

        C  F  C  F
By and by...

        C  F  C  F
By and by...