Oh, the old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be,
Ain't what she used to be, ain't what she used to be.
The old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be,
Many long years ago.
Many long years ago, many long years ago.
The old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be,
Many long years ago.
The old gray mare, she kicked on the whiffletree,
Kicked on the whiffletree, kicked on the whiffletree
The old gray mare, she kicked on the whiffletree
Many long years ago.
Many long years ago, many long years ago,
The old gray mare, she kicked on the whiffletree
Many long years ago.
What made me think of this old song we sang as kids? Maybe because I'm an old gray mare now. I looked up the song online so I wouldn't have to type it all out, and, much to my surprise, the second verse is different from what we sang when I was a child. Here's our version:
Oh, the old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be,
Ain't what she used to be, ain't what she used to be.
The old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be,
Many long years ago.
Many long years ago, many long years ago.
The old gray mare, she ain't what she used to be,
Many long years ago.
The old gray mare went (raspberry sound) down the avenue,
(raspberry sound) down the avenue, (raspberry sound) down the avenue.
The old gray mare went (raspberry sound) down the avenue,
Many long years ago.
Did anyone else sing the vulgar version, or was it just naughty New Orleans kids?
I love your version Mimi!
ReplyDeleteLisa, I do, too. The other version is thin gruel, indeed.
ReplyDeleteI don't remember the raspberries sound version but I like it! Thin gruel says it well.
ReplyDeleteIf there is a naughty version of any song, I assume that's the one our Mimi sang. (ducks)
ReplyDeleteY'all see why it's impossible for me to get inside the heads of the fundie types.
ReplyDeleteI never heard either of those second verses -- I think we made up totally different words to the whole song. - probably bad.
ReplyDeleteWe sang something similar as kids in the UK, but it was sung, you will be sorry to hear, to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic!
ReplyDelete"John Brown's cow went ["raspberry"] against the wall" [x 3]
"So they rubbed it with the camphorated oil."
"Camphor-amphor-amphor-ated" [also x 3 - this is the "Glory Hallelujah" bit]
"So they rubbed it with the camphorated oil."
Whoa! Now we's a gittin' goin'.
ReplyDeleteI miss the segment on Prairie Home Companion where people from the audience sang "folk" songs (I think that was what they called it on the show). I think the younger gens don't have the background of this kind of song. The worms crawl in.... And Lapin, we sang your song too in Girl Scout camp in Massachusetts!
ReplyDeleteamyj
Amy, the young 'uns don't have the background. We sang and sang on up through high school, even when we were not in organized groups like the Scouts.
ReplyDelete"Raspberry" is the only instance I can think of of Cockney rhyming slang carrying over into US English. In this sense, it is short for "Raspberry tart", which rhymes with ....?
ReplyDeleteMimi, we sang the same version as you did. I wonder if that's because I was an army brat and who knows where the culprit who taught us the song came from.
ReplyDeleteLapin, I can't imagine what you're talking about.
ReplyDeleteAmelia! I feel so validated.
The only camphorated oil song I knew was about "little Peter Rabbit" who "had a flea upon his ear and he rubbed it with camphor-ated oil. Being close to tone deaf I'm not sure what the tune was.
ReplyDeleteI've heard "the old gray mare" but didn't "sing" it. However, very fond of Peter Rabbit.
Lapin
ReplyDeleteMy kids also still sing the camphorated oil song, but there are much more violent words to the same tune around:
Glory glory halelujah
treacher hit me with a ruler
so I crept across the floor
with a bazooka 94
now we ain't got no teacher no more.
We used to sing a similar song to Erika called our sergeant major jumped from 40 thousand feet, the chorus went
ReplyDeleteGlory, glory, what a hell of a way to die
when your hanging by your b***S and your a**e is in the sky
Glory, glory what a hell of a way to die
But he ain't going jump no more.
"They scraped him off the tarmac like a pound of strawberry jam." Used to sing that one as well, Petty.
ReplyDelete"The Old Gray Mare" gave us a lovely thread, didn't she? Thanks all, for your contributions.
ReplyDeleteThe one I remember was sung to the theme of The Bridge on the River Kwai:
ReplyDeleteComet. It makes your teeth turn green.
Comet. It tastes like Listerine.
Comet, will make you vomit.
So buy some Comet and vomit today.
Oh John, thanks. That's just the sort of thing kids love. I was grown-up when the movie came out, so I've never heard that song.
ReplyDeleteBe REAL careful with the march from the Bridge on the River Kwai (aka "Colonel Bogie"), JB. The best-known words - known, at any rate, to almost all of its British audience, tho' not to most Americans, are:
ReplyDeleteHitler, had only got one ball;
Goering, had two, but very small;
Himmler, had something sim'lar;
And poor old Goballs, had no balls, at all.
Going back to 'our sergeant major'. Obviously a similar version to ours, Lapinbizarre, but we sang for verse 2 - "He landed on the runway like a blob of strawberry jam" & then for verse 3 - "We spread him on the scones when the vicar came to tea".
ReplyDeleteOn a similar note, do you know the children's rhyme 'This little piggy went to market'? What do people say the third little piggy ate? I say "This little piggy ate cheese and bread" whilst Themethatis insists it's "This little little piggy ate roast beef".
Lapin, leave it to you....
ReplyDeletePetty, the final answer for what the third little piggy ate is "roast beef". You can't trump your hubby and me standing together.
Yuk. Isn't that too close to the little piggy being a cannibal? Or is it? Either way I'll carry on singing my version, thank you.
ReplyDeleteLike the vicar verse, Petty. Haven't heard that one.
ReplyDelete"This little piggy had roast beef" in my version. S Lancashire. Regional variations, perhaps?
Mimi, the Hitler thing was a sub-text to "B on the R K" that had the whole of Britain grinning (probably the ANZACs as well) when the film came out, but which went straight over US heads. It's definitely not a "leave it to you..."thing. The Wikipedia "Colonel Bogey" entry includes the observation "although the vulgar lyrics were not used in the film, British audiences of the time fully understood the subtextual humour of "Hitler Has Only Got One Ball" being sung by prisoners of war."
And a long Wiki entry, which I missed, on the Hitler lyric and variants of same.
ReplyDeleteGranmere, honey...
ReplyDeleteI and the cousins sang the same version as you did in Northeastern PA, out of the hearing of mother and the aunts, who tried to serve as good examples for the extended tribe of cousins. It didn't work because we knew rude, vulgar and outright obscene variations on dozens of songs. Most of which I can't remember until I hear the "clean" version again.
There were twenty five of us first cousins born between 1939 and 1959although the vast majority were born in the ten years 1945-55.
A terrifying WASP / Anglo-Irish baby boom. My formative years were a kaliedoscope of Birthday parties, christenings, confirmations and weddings.
Lapin, I'm a 12th generation American and Hitler has one ball was the only version of the Col. Bogey March I knew until the Bridge on the River Kwai came out. Go figure.
ReplyDeleteOur version of This Little Piggie either ate Roast Beef or Baked Beans and Ham. Truly a carnivorous piggy, which they are!!rural areas abound with old wives tales of drunken farmers falling into the pen and being nibbled to death by porky and petunia.
Gerry cher, we were only 16 grandchildren on my mother's side, but that kept us pretty busy. We sang that song (but not all our songs!) in front of the grown-ups, and they laughed, thereby encouraging us in our vulgarity. But there were limits, and we knew the boundaries, and we didn't cross the boundaries.
ReplyDeleteWell Lapin, someone went to a whole lotta trouble at Wiki to do the research on the song.
ReplyDeleteMimi,
ReplyDeleteMother and the Aunties pretended horror, when hearing us. Gran and Grandmere hooted while Dad and the Uncles had taught us most of the raunchier versions in the repertoire.
Grandmere, who was a daughter of the old South taught us all to play cards and taught the more adept less than honorable ways of dealing she had learned from her Uncle, a professional card player who travelled the east coast resort towns from Boothbay to Amelia Island. Her stories of him were wonderful and we all regretted his early death (before any of us were born).
From a reader who shall be nameless unless the person owns up:
ReplyDeleteWe did the second verse is the 40's and early 50's, with the exception of a few word changes.
Given the location of the whiffletree, we sang, " The old grey mare, she dumped on the whiffletree."
We didn't however, use the word "dumped."
I never heard the raspberrying version. That must be uniquely Nola.
Then I assume the song would go, "The old gray mare, she shit on the whippletree...."
Of course, I could be wrong.
The old gray mare, she "pffwwt" on the whiffle tree
ReplyDeleteThat's the version my grandparents taught us, about 70 years ago.