“Oscar Hammerstein suffered the same lack of recognition as a lyricist as Lorenz Hart. Jerome Kern’s wife was being introduced at a social function. “Her husband wrote Ol’ Man River,” announced the hostess. “Oh no,” interjected Hammerstein’s wife, “my husband wrote Ol’ Man River”; her husband wrote ‘da-da-da-da’.”
(from a letter to The Guardian, June 2008, by John Wurr of Kingsbridge, Devon)