This 28-year old native Oklahoman wrote about a journey that
was still in its early stages for himself in the 1930s, but one for which he
wanted help, thinking it would be a trip still full of challenges. Albert
Brumley had seen enough by 1933 when he wrote “Jesus, Hold My Hand” that should
have given him reason to pause. Looking back as he neared life’s end some forty
years later, Brumley surely would have said that the request he made with his
song title must have been answered. See if you agree, and ask yourself if you’d
like to echo Albert’s words.
Just look at the times during which Albert Brumley lived,
and the facts we know about his life, and one gets a sense of what background
events probably affected his mind and spirit in 1933 when he wrote the words to
“Jesus, Hold My Hand”. He’d grown up in what
on the surface looked like a lowly sharecropping (cotton) family life, except
that his parents provided lots of musical inspiration for him, besides an
appreciation for a hard-working farm life. Predictably, he had little or no money,
particularly when he set off from his Oklahoma home for schools in Arkansas and
Missouri. His dependence on Eugene Bartlett for much of his formal music education
cannot be underestimated during his time in Arkansas at the Hartford Music
Institute. Another crucial influence in young Albert’s life was the woman,
Goldie Schell, whom he would marry in 1931 at age 26. She was, like Albert, a
product of singing schools, and so was a match for this budding composer. It’s
said that she was largely responsible for keeping her disorganized, eccentric
spouse on track as he routinely scribbled musical suggestions to himself on scraps
of paper or whatever else was handy. Though they aren’t included in biographies
of him, one wonders how the larger events of his early life --World War I and
the Great Depression—may have affected his outlook on life and its fragility. They
certainly didn’t dim his productivity, which was over 800 hymns during his
lifetime.
Was “Jesus, Hold My Hand” a request for continued divine
presence through the methods Albert had already experienced in his life? ‘Sinking
sand’, ‘the foe’, ‘hear my feeble plea’, and ‘protect me’ indeed resound like danger
signs from a guy who’d been dodging troubles, despite the positive vibes we
might read in biographic sketches of Albert Brumley. He surely must have
suspected that God’s methods had already been at work – including from
initially his parents, to Eugene Bartlett, to his wife Goldie. Was there a
specific episode, or was Albert soliciting His assistance for the broader sweep
of his coming life? Perhaps it was both, but what do you think Albert might
have said years later was the response he got? As his life drew to a close,
this once-poor sharecropper had many songs published in multiple languages, had
established his own publishing company (which one son still operates), and had
become part of three different Halls of Fame (Nashville Songwriters, Gospel
Music, and Oklahoma Music Halls of Fame). What would have been your answer? What
is
your answer as you look back?
Biographical information on the composer obtained from the
book “Our Garden of Song”, edited by Gene C. Finley, Howard Publishing Company,
1980.
See following sites for some biographic information on
composer also: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/b/r/u/brumley_ae.htm
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