Storyline
The song talks of a young Arkansas boy who would skip school and visit a local auction barn. Becoming mesmerized by the auction chant, he decides he wants to be an auctioneer, regularly practising the chant behind the family barn.
Though his parents are initially displeased with his career choice, they eventually relent, but (not wanting their family name to be tarnished because of poor auctioneering skills) they send him to auction school to properly learn the trade.
He returns home a full-fledged auctioneer. Gradually, he becomes a top quality auctioneer, to a point where he ends up purchasing an airplane just to keep up with his sudden business demands.
Van Dyke later stated that the story was largely true; the only artistic license he took with it was changing his cousin's home state from Missouri to Arkansas for scansion purposes: "nothing rhymed with Missouri." [6]
Mitchell Parish was an American lyricist, notably as a writer of songs for stage and screen.
Richard Wayne Van Dyke is an American actor and comedian. His career has spanned over seven decades in film, television, and stage. Van Dyke is the recipient of a Golden Globe, Tony, Grammy, a Daytime Emmy, and four Primetime Emmys. He was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1995 and the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2012. He was honored with the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2013, the Kennedy Center Honors in 2021, and was recognized as a Disney Legend.
Leroy Frank Van Dyke is an American country music and honky-tonk singer and guitarist, best known for his hits "The Auctioneer" (1956) and "Walk on By" (1961).
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Auction chant is a rhythmic repetition of numbers and "filler words" spoken by auctioneers when taking bids at an auction. Auction chanting is a method of conducting live auctions frequently found in North America where it is practiced in English, Spanish, French and other languages. It is much less common outside North America, and the most notable exceptions within North America are auction houses with significant ties elsewhere in the world such as art brokerages. The chant consists of at least the current price, the asking price to outbid and words to keep the audience engaged. Auctioneers typically develop their own style, and competitions are held to judge them. Outside of auctions, the chant has been the subject of music and used in commercials and film.
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