My driftin' memory goes back to the spring of '43   When I was just a child in momma's arms   My daddy plowed the ground and prayed someday he could leave   This run-down mortgaged Oklahoma farm      And then one night I heard my daddy sayin' to my momma   That he'd finally saved enough to go   California was his dream, a paradise for he had seen   Pictures in magazines that told him so      California cottonfields   Where labor camps were filled   With worried men with broken dreams   California cottonfields   As close to wealth as daddy ever came      Almost everything we had was sold or left behind   From my daddy's plow to the fruit that momma canned   Some folks came to say farewell or see what all we had to sell   Some just came to shake my daddy's hand      That model a was loaded down and California bound   And a change of luck was just four days away   But the only change that I remember seein' for my daddy   Was when his dark hair turned to silver gray      California cottonfields   Where labor camps were filled   With worried men with broken dreams   California cottonfields   As close to wealth as daddy ever came