Water boy

In the USA, a water boy (sometimes spelled waterboy) is someone who works on the sidelines and provides water or other drinks to athletes. The phrase has also been used to described diminutive figures who serve another team or person in the business and political worlds, in a slightly derogatory manner (ex. "Bill is the CEOs water boy").

The position has a long history in athletics. In the 1869 New Jersey vs. Rutgers football game, one of the earliest American football games, an unnamed water boy is documented giving aid to a Rutgers player.

Among notable people who served as water boys was President Herbert Hoover, who was the Stanford Cardinal football's first water boy.

History

Although the term in modern American usage is now associated with sports, traditionally a water boy was a boy employed in traditional farming or industry to provide water for farm workers or machinery. In the cotton plantations, just as the modern manual harvesting or picking, the water carrier is in constant demand. This is documented in the folk song Waterboy "Water boy, where are you hidin'?" which is only the best known of many folk and plantation water-call songs.

Waterboy (song)

"Waterboy" (a.k.a. "The Water Boy") is an American traditional folk song. It is built on the call "Water boy, where are you hidin'?" The call is one of several water boy calls in cotton plantation folk tradition.

Originally a black prison work song composed by Jacques Wolfe, a Romanian immigrant, Waterboy became known as a jazz arrangement by Avery Robinson popularized "Water Boy" in the 1920s. From 1949 onwards, it has also been performed by many blues and folk artists.

The opening call to the "water boy" has been said to bear a resemblance to melodies found in classical works by Cui, Tchaikovsky and Liszt, as well as a Jewish marriage song and a Native American tune. The first melody of the subsequent refrain is similar to the old German tune "Mendebras," used for the hymn "Oh Day of Rest and Gladness."

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