Dead Man's Sand

Long before the times you can remember
In the early years of fishing on the Bay
Aluminum had not yet been discovered
Boats were built of wood the old-time way
No inboard V-8 engines
To push them through the waves
Only gaff-rigged sails they worked by hand
They were doing fine ‘til that day in 1915
One hundred lost their lives on Dead Man’s Sand

Fifty boats were stranded on the sand bar
In the middle of the Bay so far from land
The storm came up without warning
Caught them high and dry on Dead Man’s Sand
The wind whipped the water into waves so high
They couldn’t see each other through the spray
The tide came in with a vengeance
And washed the people all away

They can see the rolling wall of water
They have no place to run, no place to stand
They can only wait for it to hit them
While they sit high and dry
On Dead Man’s Sand

One hundred miles north of the harbor
Where the caribou cross the mountainside
Some people who don’t care at all about us
Want to build a dam two miles wide
There are forces more powerful than concrete
No structure so strong that it can’t fall
Ten billion tons of toxic waste behind that dam
If it breaks, have mercy on us all

We can see the rolling wall of water
We have no place to run, no place to stand
We can only wait for it to hit us
Like those poor lost souls
On Dead Man’s Sand