I originally got this from my Mother. She had learned it in Grammar School (1910 or so) and remembered it sung to the tune of "The Old Oaken Bucket). There was no author indicated and it was slightly different than the version here. I later found it in a booklet put out by the town of Ipswich on the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the town in 1880. It was part of a much longer poem of eight pages that I have not yet transcribed.
Ipswich Families
Rev. J. O. Knowles
How dear to my heart are the names heard in childhood,
When fond recollection decrees their review!
The Caldwells and Treadwells, and a tall Underwood,
And all the old codgers my early days knew;
The flock of the Shatswells, the Lanes who lived near them,
Russells and Rosses where the pudding-bag split;
The Perleys and Potters, with Nourses to rear them,
Are the names of some people I heard when a chit.
The old-fashioned titles, the time honored titles,
The names of the people I heard when a chit.
The Kimballs and Cogswells are names heard with pleasure,
And Baker, and Kinsman and Conant as well;
The Browns, Smiths and Wades, with the Waits, fill this measure,
And make room for Appleton, Dodge and Bell;
The Willcombs, the Farleys, the Haskells and Goodhues,
The Heards and the Hodgkinses, the Clarks, and the Millers,
The Colburns and Choates, Cowles and Perkins crews,
The Lakemans, the Willetts, the Rusts, and the Spillers,
The old-fashioned titles, the time honored titles,
The names of the people I heard in my youth.
How sweet to old crones in some kitchen's warm corner
To call up the names, Ellsworth, Sutton and Wise,
And tell of the pranks of Lord, Manning or Warner,
In the days when they dazzled their girlish eyes!
And now, far removed from the home of my childhood,
Of Harrises, Dunnells, and Newmans I hear,
With Averills, Fellowses and Fosters as good,
The names of the people once sweet to my ear--
The old-fashioned titles, the time honored titles,
The names of the people still sweet to my ear.