The lyrics are based on "Cow-Cow Boogie", a 1942 song about a singing cowboy. Bradshaw rewrote lines, such as "a ditty he learned in the city" and "get along, get hip little doggies, and he trucked 'em on down the old fairway", to meet his new scenario. Although the King Records single lists "Bradshaw-Mann" as the songwriters, reissues and subsequent recordings of "The Train Kept A-Rollin'" credit Tiny Bradshaw, Lois Mann (a pseudonym of King Records' owner Syd Nathan), and Howard Kay. BMI, the performing rights organization, lists the songwriters/composers as "Myron C. Bradshaw, Sydney Nathan, and Howard Kay". According to music historian Larry Birnbaum, "Mann's name was plainly added to allow Syd Nathan to siphon off a share of the publishing royalties, as label owners routinely did in those days; as for Kay, his identity remains a mystery".