Troubadour Jim Preddy tells the saga in song as he introduced it at the State House Inn Springfield, Illinois, May 1961.
It happened one November night, Near Summum, Illinois, A handsome, rich farmer, he disappeared, A mys’tery to even his boy. Leaving Macomb at 8 o’clock, In his new Cadillac, Fay Rawley drove rapidly out of town, Never again to come back. Just three hours later the car was seen, Down in the Key Coal Mine, And ten minutes later they buried him, And didn’t leave nary a sign. Since Fay was a rover, he wasn’t missed, For fourteen days and nights, A few people wondered where he had gone, And said he was on one of his flights. There comes into office a resolute man, A quiet ex-marine; He swore he’d find Rawley down in the mine, Where last his car had been seen. He never stopped searching though people laughed, But calmly went about, He dug in the coal mine for many days, And showed he had not been misled.
