Parallel Anthology Track 55
Track 55: Reverend F M McGee - Fifty Miles of Elbow Room Victor 23401; Recorded in New York, 16.6.1930
No image of record label available. Neither anthology booklet assigns authorship, nor does www.78discography.com or victor.library.ucsb.edu.
According to the Old Weird America blog, "The song was written by Herbert Buffum (1879-1939)".
This would imply that this composition has been public domain since 1st January 2010.
Parallel anthology main index page
Alternative versions
Fifty Miles of Elbow Room by the Carter Family recorded in 1941 (according to the Old Weird America blog): Spotify According to wikipedia, "On some Carter Family recordings, Sara is incorrectly credited as author of the songs 'Fifty Miles of Elbow Room' and 'Keep on the Firing Line'; in truth she discovered these public domain songs when they were being sung at a Seventh-day Adventist church she visited. RCA gave her songwriter credit, as it did A. P. Carter on his public domain discoveries."
Fifty Miles of Elbow Room by Turk Murphy and his Jazz Band recorded in 1958 (according to www.musicstack.com): Spotify Unable to determine whether an arrangement or writing credit was claimed for this version.
Fifty Miles of Elbow Room by Hank Locklin Spotify According to wikipedia, Locklin released a version of this song in 1950, however, I have been unable to find whether he claimed arrangement credit for this version, or to confirm whether the Spotify link above is the same version.