Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
E301164
"Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" is a famous Great Depression-era American song that poignantly captures the disillusionment and hardship of unemployed workers.
All labels observed (4)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? canonical | 7 |
| "Brother, can you spare a dime?" | 1 |
| Brother, Can You Spare a Dime | 1 |
| Buddy, Can You Spare a Dime? | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T2824431 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? Context triple: [E. Y. Harburg, notableWork, Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?]
-
A.
Yankee Doodle Dandy
Yankee Doodle Dandy is a 1942 American musical biographical film starring James Cagney as songwriter George M. Cohan, celebrated for its patriotic songs and Cagney’s Academy Award-winning performance.
-
B.
Lady, Be Good
"Lady, Be Good" is a 1924 Broadway musical comedy with music by George Gershwin and lyrics by Ira Gershwin, best known for its hit songs and for featuring Fred Astaire in one of his early major stage roles.
-
C.
Alexander's Ragtime Band
"Alexander's Ragtime Band" is a hugely popular 1911 ragtime song that helped launch Irving Berlin's career and became one of the early standards of American popular music.
-
D.
I Got Rhythm
"I Got Rhythm" is a popular jazz standard composed by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, renowned for its catchy melody and influential chord progression widely used in jazz improvisation.
-
E.
I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’
"I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’" is a cheerful, folk-influenced song from George Gershwin’s opera *Porgy and Bess*, celebrating contentment and spiritual wealth over material possessions.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? Target entity description: "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" is a famous Great Depression-era American song that poignantly captures the disillusionment and hardship of unemployed workers.
-
A.
Yankee Doodle Dandy
Yankee Doodle Dandy is a 1942 American musical biographical film starring James Cagney as songwriter George M. Cohan, celebrated for its patriotic songs and Cagney’s Academy Award-winning performance.
-
B.
Lady, Be Good
"Lady, Be Good" is a 1924 Broadway musical comedy with music by George Gershwin and lyrics by Ira Gershwin, best known for its hit songs and for featuring Fred Astaire in one of his early major stage roles.
-
C.
Alexander's Ragtime Band
"Alexander's Ragtime Band" is a hugely popular 1911 ragtime song that helped launch Irving Berlin's career and became one of the early standards of American popular music.
-
D.
I Got Rhythm
"I Got Rhythm" is a popular jazz standard composed by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, renowned for its catchy melody and influential chord progression widely used in jazz improvisation.
-
E.
I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’
"I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’" is a cheerful, folk-influenced song from George Gershwin’s opera *Porgy and Bess*, celebrating contentment and spiritual wealth over material possessions.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (45)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
Great Depression-era song
ⓘ
popular song ⓘ song ⓘ |
| addresses |
broken promises of prosperity
ⓘ
economic inequality ⓘ veterans’ plight ⓘ |
| alsoKnownAs |
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime
ⓘ
linked to:
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
Buddy, Can You Spare a Dime? ⓘ
linked to:
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
|
| associatedWithEvent | Wall Street Crash of 1929 aftermath ⓘ |
| composer | Jay Gorney ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
United States
ⓘ
linked to:
United States of America
|
| culturalSignificance |
anthem of the Great Depression
ⓘ
classic American standard ⓘ |
| firstPerformanceYear | 1932 ⓘ |
| genre |
political song
ⓘ
popular music ⓘ protest song ⓘ |
| hasFamousLine |
"Brother, can you spare a dime?"
ⓘ
linked to:
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
"They used to tell me I was building a dream" ⓘ |
| hasInfluenceOn | later protest music in the United States ⓘ |
| historicalContext | early 1930s United States ⓘ |
| includedIn | American songbook ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| lyricalSubject |
former worker
ⓘ
unemployed veteran ⓘ |
| lyricist |
Yip Harburg
ⓘ
linked to:
E. Y. Harburg
|
| narrativePerspective | first person ⓘ |
| notableRecordingBy |
Al Jolson
ⓘ
Bing Crosby ⓘ Rudy Vallée ⓘ |
| originalMedium | Broadway musical revue ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1932 ⓘ |
| setIn |
United States during Great Depression
ⓘ
linked to:
Great Depression
|
| symbolizes |
betrayal of workers
ⓘ
collapse of economic security ⓘ |
| theme |
American Dream
ⓘ
Great Depression ⓘ disillusionment ⓘ economic hardship ⓘ unemployment ⓘ |
| timePeriodDepicted | Great Depression ⓘ |
| typeOf | social commentary song ⓘ |
| usesMusicalStyle |
jazz-influenced harmony
ⓘ
minor key melody ⓘ |
| writtenFor | musical revue Americana ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? Description of subject: "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" is a famous Great Depression-era American song that poignantly captures the disillusionment and hardship of unemployed workers.
Referenced by (10)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
linked to: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
linked to: Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?