Editing Johnny Mercer (section)

==Early life ==
[[File:Mercer birthplace.jpg|thumb|right|Mercer's childhood home, 224–226 East Gwinnett Street]][[File:Mercer House 2017.jpg|thumb|right|The historic [[Mercer House (Savannah, Georgia)|Mercer House]] in [[Savannah, Georgia]], built for the songwriter's great-grandfather. (Mercer did not live there.)]]
Mercer was born in 1909, in [[Savannah, Georgia]], where one of his first jobs, aged 10, was sweeping floors at the original 1919 location of [[Leopold's Ice Cream]].<ref name=ds>Simón, Melanie Bowden, [https://deepsouthmag.com/2020/09/02/leopolds-ice-cream-a-century-of-tasty-memories/ "Leopold's Ice Cream: A Century of Tasty Memories" (excerpt)], ''Deep South Magazine'', September 2, 2020.</ref><ref name=ut>{{cite web|url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/destinations/2016/04/02/savannah-georgia/82532776/ |title=Road Trip USA: In Savannah, heritage comes in many flavors|first=Carson|last=Vaughan|work=[[USA Today]]|date=April 2, 2016}}</ref> Mercer lived on [[Lincoln Street]], a block away from the store's East Gwinnett and [[Habersham Street|Habersham]] location.<ref name=smn2>[https://www.savannahnow.com/article/20100325/LIFESTYLE/303259827 "Leopold's Ice Cream: A family affair"] - ''[[Savannah Morning News]]'', March 25, 2010</ref><ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20161130002340/https://www.leopoldsicecream.com/about-us/our-history/ Our History] - Leopold's Ice Cream's official website</ref>

Mercer's father, George Anderson Mercer, was a prominent attorney and real-estate developer. Mercer's mother, Lillian Elizabeth (née Ciucevich), was the daughter of a Croatian immigrant father and a mother with Irish ancestry. Lillian was the senior Mercer's secretary and second wife. Lillian's father, born in [[Lastovo]], in 1834 to Ivana Cucevic and Marijo Dundovic, was a merchant seaman who ran the Union blockade during the [[U.S. Civil War|Civil War]].{{sfn|Lees|2004|p=15}} Mercer was George's fourth son, and his first son by Lillian. His great-grandfather was Confederate General [[Hugh Weedon Mercer]] and he was a direct descendant of [[American Revolutionary War]] General [[Hugh Mercer]], a Scottish soldier-physician who died at the [[Battle of Princeton]]. Mercer was also a distant cousin of General [[George S. Patton]].{{sfn|Lees|2004|p=11}}

Mercer liked music as a small child and attributed his musical talent to his mother, who would sing sentimental ballads. Mercer's father also sang, mostly old Scottish songs. His aunt told him he was humming music when he was six months old and later she took him to see minstrel and vaudeville shows where he heard "[[coon song]]s" and ragtime.{{sfn|Furia|2003|p=11}} The family's summer home, "Vernon View", was on the tidal waters and Mercer's long summers there among mossy trees, saltwater marshes, and soft, starry nights inspired him years later.{{sfn|Lees|2004|p=21}}

Mercer's exposure to black music was perhaps unique among the white songwriters of his generation.{{Citation needed|date=January 2023}} As a child, Mercer had African-American playmates and servants, and he listened to the fishermen and vendors about him, who spoke and sang in the [[Gullah language]] (also known as "Geechee"). He was also attracted to Black church services. Mercer later stated, "Songs always fascinated me more than anything."{{sfn|Furia|2003|pp=12–13}} He had no formal musical training but was singing in a choir by six and at 11 or 12 he had memorized almost all of the songs he had heard and became curious about who wrote them. He once asked his brother who the best [[Tin Pan Alley]] songwriter was, and his brother said [[Irving Berlin]].<ref name="wilk">{{cite book |first=Max |last=Wilk |author-link=Max Wilk |year=1997 |title=They're Playing Our Song |publisher=[[Da Capo Press]] |location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|isbn=978-0918432797}}</ref>

Despite Mercer's early exposure to music, his talent was clearly in creating the words and singing, not in playing music, though early on he had hoped to become a composer. In addition to the lyrics that Mercer memorized, he was an avid reader and wrote adventure stories. His attempts to play the trumpet and piano were not successful, and he never could read musical scores with any facility, relying instead on his own notation system.{{sfn|Lees|2004|p=28}}

As a teenager in the [[Jazz Era]], he searched for records by early black blues/jazz figures including [[Ma Rainey]], [[Bessie Smith]], and [[Louis Armstrong]]. His father owned the first car in town, and Mercer's teenage social life was enhanced by his driving privilege, which sometimes verged on recklessness.{{sfn|Furia|2003|p=22}} The family would motor to the mountains near [[Asheville, North Carolina]], to escape the Savannah heat and there Mercer learned to dance (from [[Arthur Murray]] himself) and to flirt with [[Southern belle]]s, his natural sense of rhythm helping him on both accounts. (Later, Mercer wrote a humorous song called "Arthur Murray Taught Me Dancing in a Hurry".)

Mercer attended the exclusive [[Woodberry Forest School]] in Virginia until 1927. Although not a top student, he was active in literary and poetry societies and as a humor writer for the school's publications. In addition, his exposure to classic literature augmented his already rich store of vocabulary and phraseology. He began to scribble ingenious, sometimes strained, rhymed phrases for later use. Mercer was also the class clown and a prankster, and member of the "hop" committee that booked musical entertainment on campus.{{sfn|Furia|2003|p=25}}

Mercer was already somewhat of an authority on jazz at an early age. His yearbook stated: "No orchestra or new production can be authoritatively termed 'good' until Johnny's stamp of approval has been placed upon it. His ability to 'get hot' under all conditions and at all times is uncanny."{{sfn|Furia|2003|p=26}} Mercer began to write songs, an early effort being "Sister Susie, Strut Your Stuff".{{sfn|Lees|2004|p=32}}

Given his family's long association with [[Princeton, New Jersey]], and [[Princeton University]],<ref>Located in Mercer County, New Jersey, which is named after Mercer's 3rd-great-grandfather.</ref> Mercer was groomed to go to school there, but those ambitions were dashed by his father's financial setbacks in the late 1920s. He went to work in his father's recovering business, collecting rent and running errands, but soon grew bored with the routine and with Savannah.