, photographed by
Alan Lomax in the 1940s Lyrics appearing in the song were first recorded in print by
Howard Odum in 1905: However, these lyrics are known to be
floater lines, appearing in various African-American songs of that period, notably in the "Grade-Songs", which are about prison captains and have nothing to do with a train or a light. The first printed reference to the song itself was in a 1923 issue of
Adventure magazine, a three-times-a-month
pulp magazine published by the Ridgway Company. In 1927
Carl Sandburg published two different versions of "Midnight Special" in his
The American Songbag, the first published versions. The song was first commercially recorded on the OKeh label in 1926 as "Pistol Pete's Midnight Special" by Dave "Pistol Pete" Cutrell, a member of
McGinty's Oklahoma Cow Boy Band. Cutrell follows the traditional song except for semi-comedic stanzas about
Billy McGinty and Otto Gray, who took over as bandleader and manager when McGinty left the band, and "a cowboy band": In March 1929, the band, now Otto Gray and the Oklahoma Cowboys, recorded the song again, this time with the traditional title using only the traditional lyrics.
Sam Collins recorded the song commercially in 1927 under the title "The Midnight Special Blues" for
Gennett Records. His version also follows the traditional style. His is the first to name the woman in the story, Little Nora, and he refers to the ''Midnight Special's'' "ever-living" light: In 1934,
Huddie William "Lead Belly" Ledbetter recorded a version of the song at
Angola Prison for
John and
Alan Lomax, who mistakenly attributed it to him as the author. However, Ledbetter, for his Angola session, appears to have inserted several stanzas relating to a
1923 Houston jailbreak into the traditional song. Ledbetter recorded at least three versions of the song, one with the
Golden Gate Quartet, a gospel group (recorded for
RCA at Victor Studio #2, New York City, June 15, 1940). John and Alan Lomax, in their book,
Best Loved American Folk Songs, told a credible story identifying the
Midnight Special as a train from Houston shining its light into a cell in the
Sugar Land Prison. They also describe Ledbetter's version as "the Negro jailbird's ballad to match
Hard Times Poor Boy. Like so many American folk songs, its hero is not a man but a train." The light of the train is seen as the light of salvation, the train which could take them away from the prison walls. It is highly reminiscent of the imagery of such gospel songs as "
Let the Light from Your Lighthouse Shine on Me".
Carl Sandburg had a different view. He believed the subject of the song would rather be run over by a train than spend more time in jail. Although later versions place the locale of the song near Houston, early versions such as "Walk Right In Belmont" (
Wilmer Watts; Frank Wilson, 1927) and "North Carolina Blues" (Roy Martin, 1930)—both essentially the same song as "Midnight Special"—place it in North Carolina. Most of the early versions, however, have no particular location. Only one recording, collected by the Lomaxes at the
Mississippi State Penitentiary, actually identifies the railroad operating the
Midnight Special—the
Illinois Central, which had a route through Mississippi. ==Other versions==