At Mail Call Today

{{Infobox song

| name = At Mail Call Today

| cover =

| alt =

| published = {{start date|1945|3|14}} Western music pub. Co., Hollywood, Calif.{{Cite book |last=Library of Congress. Copyright Office. |url=http://archive.org/details/catalogofcopyrig31libr |title=Catalog of Copyright Entries 1945 Music New Series Vol 40 Pt 3 No 1 |date=1945 |publisher=U.S. Govt. Print. Off. |others=United States Copyright Office |language=English}}

| type = single

| artist = Gene Autry

| album =

| B-side = I'll Be Back

| released = {{Start date|1945|03}}{{Cite web|title=At Mail Call Today|url=http://www.45worlds.com/78rpm/record/6737|url-status=live|access-date=2021-07-19|website=45worlds|ref=At Mail Call Today-45worlds|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170911133907/http://www.45worlds.com/78rpm/record/6737 |archive-date=2017-09-11 }}

| format =

| recorded = {{Start date|1944|12|06}}

| studio = CBS Columbia Square Studio, Hollywood, California

| venue =

| genre = Country & Western

| length = {{Duration|m=2|s=49}}

| label = Okeh 6737

| writer = Gene Autry, Fred Rose

| producer =

| prev_title = Don't Fence Me In / Gonna Build a Big Fence Around Texas

| prev_year = 1944

| next_title = Don't Hang Around Me Anymore

| next_year = 1945

}}

"At Mail Call Today" is a song written by American country music artist Gene Autry and Fred Rose. The two had a successful song writing partnership dating back to 1941, including "Be Honest With Me{{cite magazine|date=30 August 1941|title=Hillbilly Recordings – Month Ending August 30, 1941|url=http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/40s/1941/BB-1941-08-30.pdf|magazine=The Billboard|location=Cincinnati, Ohio|page=104|access-date=17 July 2021}}", "Tweedle-O-Twill" and "Tears On My Pillow". Rose, with Roy Acuff, founded Acuff-Rose Music Publishing in 1942, and in 1947, would go on to producing Hank Williams.{{Cite web|title=Hank Williams 78rpm Issues|url=https://jazzdiscography.com/Artists/hank-williams/hank-williams-78-releases.php|access-date=2021-09-09|website=jazzdiscography.com}} Autry, after a brief lull in film making due to WWII, would be back to his pre-war output by 1946.{{Cite web|title=Sioux City Sue|url=https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/90302/sioux-city-sue|access-date=2021-09-09|website=Turner Classic Movies|language=en}}

Background

The song is similar to other contemporary love songs and deals with the possibility of unfaithfulness.{{cite book|last1=Smith|first1=Kathleen E. R.|title=God Bless America ; Tin Pan Alley Goes to War|date=2003|publisher=The University Press of Kentucky|isbn=0-8131-2256-2|page=44}} The lyrics describe a young soldier opening a Dear John letter at mail call and learning that the girl he loved from back home has left him. The final words reflect the soldier's despair:

Good luck and God bless you

Wherever you stray

The world for me ended

At Mail Call To-day.{{cite book|last1=Jones|first1=John Bush|title=The Songs that Fought the War|date=2006|publisher=University Press of New England|location=Lebanon, NH|isbn=978-1-58465-443-8|pages=256–57}}

Chart performance

The song, recorded in December 1944, was Gene Autry's most successful song on the Juke Box Folk charts, peaking at number one for eight weeks with a total of twenty-two weeks on the charts.{{cite book |title= The Billboard Book Of Top 40 Country Hits: 1944–2006, Second edition|last=Whitburn |first=Joel |author-link=Joel Whitburn |year=2004 |publisher=Record Research |page=35}} The B-side of "At Mail Call Today", a song entitled, "I'll Be Back" peaked at number seven on the same chart.

Charts

class="wikitable sortable"

!Chart (1945)

!Peak
position

U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles

|align="center"|1

At Mail Call Today

Background

Chart performance

Charts

References

Further reading