Recorded by Thom Shepherd
Music and Lyrics by Owen Temple and Thom Shepherd
This was my grandpa’s favorite shirt
He got it in Fort Worth
He loved the pearl snaps and the piping on it too
You see this embroidered rose
Well, in the center there’s a bullet hole
that matches the one in the back where it went clean through
And he’s gone now, rest his soul
And I’m the reason this bullet hole
Is in this very shirt here that I wear
Oh I loved him but I’m the one that put it there
With that .22 long he bought in Arkansas
that hung above the mantle on his living room wall
Well, he’d take it to the shooting match
He won turkeys and he won hams
And he kept his family fed when times were lean
When his eyes got bad enough
Well, he just hung it up
Right there on the wall for all to see
And as they moved from state to state
It always held its special place
And for over forty years it rested right up there
I told him one day I’d like to have it
He said, “well son it’s yours go grab it”
So I went and got a kitchen chair
To take down that .22 long he bought in Arkansas
that hung above the mantle on his living room wall
I still recall the sound
The crack of that fateful round
As my finger brushed the trigger
As he helped me take it down-
You know it dang near grazed his ear
Hell that gun had been loaded for forty three years
And this story might sound a bit hard to believe
But that bullet passed through his closet wall
And all his clothes, clean through ‘em all
And even this, favorite shirt of his that he left to me
And now that .22 long he bought in Arkansas
Hangs above the mantel on our living room wall
You know it dang near killed grandpa but the story still lives on
of the bullet hole that I put in my grandpa’s pearl snap shirt with
the .22 long
