Written By: Ben Cosgrove
Back in 1995, the singer-songwriter and cartoonist Peter Blegvad released a song later made semi-famous when a cover version by Loudon Wainwright III was featured on the soundtrack for Judd Apatow’s Knocked Up. The song, “Daughter,” is as sweet and true as any song ever written by a parent to a child, and manages to capture in relatively few words the intense, tender, exasperating and, through it all, loving relationships that dads and daughters enjoy — or, at times, simply endure.
(Wainwright, interestingly, enough, is the father of Rufus Wainwright and the son of a longtime LIFE magazine writer and editor, Loudon Wainwright, Jr.)
Here, in a special Father’s Day gallery, LIFE.com applauds that unique familial bond with photos of famous fathers and their daughters and, for a little variety, one famous daughter and her dad.
Blegvad’s lyrics to “Daughter,” meanwhile, are worth celebrating in their own right. See them below.
“Daughter”
© 1995 Peter Blegvad
Everything she sees
she says she wants.
And everything she says she wants
I see she gets.
That’s my daughter in the water,
everything she owns I bought her,
Everything she owns.
That’s my daughter in the water,
Everything she knows I taught her.
Everything she knows.
Everything I say
She takes to heart.
And everything she takes,
She takes apart.
That’s my daughter in the water,
Every time she fell I caught her,
Every time she fell.
That’s my daughter in the water
I lost every time I fought her.
Yeah, I lost every time.
Every time she blinks
she strikes somebody blind,
And everything she thinks
Blows her tiny mind.
Happy Father’s Day, everyone.
[MORE: See the LIFE gallery, “LIFE With Famous Moms.”]
John Barrymore and daughter Diana, 1942
Eliot Elisofon The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Alfred Hitchcock and daughter Patricia, 1942
Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Orson Wells, Rita Hayworth and daughter Rebecca, 1945
Peter Stackpole The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Michael Redgrave and daughter Lynn, 1946
Ian Smith The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Gary Cooper and daughter Maria, 1949
Peter Stackpole The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Jackie and Rachel Robinson With Daughter Sharon, 1950
J.R. Eyerman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Pablo Picasso and daughter, 1951
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Harry Truman and daughter Margaret, 1952
George Skadding The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Desi Arnaz with daughter Lucie – and Lucille Ball with Desi Arnaz Jr., 1953
Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Richard Burton and daughter, 1957
Gordon Parks The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
John F. Kennedy with daughter Caroline, 1958
Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dean Martin with daughter, 1958
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Tony Curtis with daughter Jamie Lee, 1959
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
John Glenn with daughter, 1959
Ralph Morse The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Henry Fonda with daughter Jane, 1960
Leonard McCombe The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Ann-Margaret with her father, 1961
Grey Villet The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Burt Lancaster with daughter, 1961
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Al Hirschfeld with his daughter Nina, whose name he famously worked into his drawings, 1961.
(c) Bob Gomel / Courtesy of Bob Gomel
Malcolm Carpenter with daughter Candy, 1962
Ralph Morse The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
John Mills with daughter Hayley, 1962
Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Steve McQueen and Daughter, 1963
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Robert F. Kennedy with daughter Mary, 1963
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Lyndon Johnson with daughters Lucy and Lynda, 1964
Stan Wayman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Vikings QB Francis Tarkenton and daughter, 1965
Stan Wayman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Frank Sinatra and daughter Nancy, 1965
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charlie Chaplin and daughters Josephine and Victoria, 1966
Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charles Schulz and daughter, 1967
Bill Ray The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Paul Newman with daughter and wife Joanne Woodward, 1968
Mark Kauffman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Robert Redford and daughter Shauna, 1969
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman and Daughter Karina, 1969
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Jack Nicholson and daughter Jennifer, 1969
Arthur Schatz The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Donald Sutherland and daughter Rachel, 1970
Co Rentmeester The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Richard Nixon and daughter Patricia, 1971
Walter Bennett The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Bill Clinton with daughter Chelsea and wife Hillary, 1993
Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
