Released 1989
Total Playing Time:  48:25
Available on CD or Cassette
Cover Art: Robert Mechling

This early recording has stood well to the test of time. Fertile Ground, with its mix of instrumental guitar tunes (a ragtime piece and two Irish tunes by the 17th century harpist, Turlough O'Carolan, plus the medley Gilderoy/Flowers of the Forest), some blues and jazz and folk standards, plus five maritime or Great Lakes tunes. 

Songs (click on mp3 links to hear short audio clips)

Fertile Ground [doug miller]
St. Louis Tickle [barney and seymore]
The Eastland [tom & chris kastle]
Trouble in Mind [ichard m jones]
Carolan's Quarrel with the Landlady [turlough o'carolan]
Lakes of Pontchartrain [traditional]
The Bigler's Crew [traditional]
Gilderoy/Flowers of the Forest [traditional]
Lady Franklin's Lament [traditional]
Dollar Down and a Dollar a Week [traditional]
Charles O'Connor [turlough o'carolan] => [mp3, 236 Kb]
The Christmas Ship [lee murdock] => [mp3, 1.9 Mb]

City Folk's Top 25 Releases of 1989
WFUV 90.7 FM, Fordham University, Bronx, NY

The title cut, Fertile Ground, is a simple inspirational tune penned by Doug Miller of Folklore Village in Dodgeville, Wisconsin.

The Christmas Ship is a song Lee wrote to retell one of the most moving stories from Lake Michigan lore. The Rouse Simmons was a lumber schooner captained by Herman Schuenemann. Every November, at the end of the logging season, Captain Schuenemann would make one final voyage from Michigan to Chicago, with a load of freshly cut new growth pines. With an eye for drama, he would sell these Christmas trees right off his boat, docked on the Chicago River. In 1912, the Rouse Simmons was lost with all hands in a storm off Manitowoc, Wisconsin, and the loss cast a shadow on the Chicago Christmas that year. But for the next 22 years, his widow, Barbara Schuenemann, made the voyage, and carried on the tradition of the Christmas Tree Ship.

Every year, Lee Murdock presents a special event, The Christmas Ship Concert, to commemorate this story of tragedy and renewal.  This year's Christmas Ship concert will be held on Saturday, November 29, 2003, at 7:30 p.m. (always Thanksgiving weekend) at the Maple Street Chapel (an historic church located at Main & Maple Streets in Lombard, Illinois).  Tickets and info are available at 630-964-4871.

Best locally-produced album of 1989
Rich Warren, Host of The Midnight Special,WFMT Chicago

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