"This Ole House" (sometimes written "This Old House") is a
popular song written by Stuart Hamblen, and published in
1954.
Hamblen was supposedly out on a hunting expedition when he
and his fellow hunter, actor John Wayne, came across a
tumbledown hut in the mountains, many miles from civilization.
They went into the hut and there, lying amongst the rubbish and
rubble of a crumbling building, was the body of a dead man.
This inspired Hamblin to write "This Ole House", which Rosemary
Clooney and later Shakin' Stevens, treated as a bouncy novelty
number, rather than the epitaph for a mountain man that it was
meant to be.
The recorded version of "This Ole House" by Rosemary
Clooney, featuring bass vocals by Thurl Ravenscroft, reached #1
on the Billboard chart in 1954, as the flip side to her
previous #1 song, "Hey There". Clooney's version also topped
the UK Singles Chart, although there were other UK hit versions
around by Billie Anthony, and Alma Cogan, both recorded in
1954. The recording by Cogan was released by HMV as catalogue
number 7M 269. The flip side was "Skokiaan".
In March 1981, Shakin' Stevens took the song back to number
one for three weeks in the United Kingdom. His version was
re-released in 2005, after his appearance in the TV show
Hit Me Baby One More Time, and reached number 20 in the
UK chart.
The song was also covered by the Cathedral Quartet and Hovie
Lister and the Statesmen as a Southern Gospel song with
slightly modified lyrics, using the house as an analogy for an
old body about to die and the soul about to go to heaven,
usually tying the song in with "When the Saints Go Marching
In".
The song was most recently recorded by Bette Midler (in
ballad form) on her 2003 tribute to Rosemary Clooney, "Bette
Midler Sings the Rosemary Clooney Songbook", and included on
her compilation "Jackpot: The Best Bette" in 2008.