What's Your Mama's Name is a country song by Tanya Tucker, from the album of the same name. It spent one week at #1 in 1976.
The song tells, in flashback, the tragic story of Buford Wilson.
- In the first verse, 30 years prior, Wilson comes to Memphis, looking for a lost love. Nobody pays attention to him, until he approaches a young girl. He asks her a question, which becomes the song's chorus: "What's your mama's name, child? What's your mama's name?/Does she ever talk about a place called New Orleans?/Has she ever mentioned a man named Buford Wilson?/What's your mama's name, child? What's your mama's name?"
- In the second verse, 10 years later, Wilson (now an alcoholic) is sentenced to a month of hard labor in the county jail for speaking to the girl, offering her a nickel's worth of candy if she will answer his question; he was ostensibly charged with attempting to solicit a minor for unlawful purposes.
- In the third verse, "one year and some odd days ago", Wilson dies, homeless and now the responsibility of the county for his burial. In his coat a letter is found, explaining his actions: he was notified he had a daughter (with green eyes like his), and had spent his life looking for her, sadly never to do so.