Johnsons Had a Baby, The

DESCRIPTION: "Johnsons had a baby, They called him Tiny Tim, They put him in a bath tub To see if he could swim." He eats a bar of soap. A doctor and nurse are called and a lady with an alligator purse or a big black hearse.
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1949 (McIntosh-FolkSongsAndSingingGamesofIllinoisOzarks)
KEYWORDS: playparty baby doctor jumprope mother disease wordplay | bathtub soap alligator purse hearse swimming
FOUND IN: Britain(England(South)) US(MW,NE,Ro,So) New Zealand Ireland
REFERENCES (15 citations):
Opie/Opie-TheSingingGame 147, "The Johnsons Had a Baby" (1 text)
Carey-MarylandFolkloreAndFolklife, pp. 79, "(no title)" (1 text)
McIntosh-FolkSongsAndSingingGamesofIllinoisOzarks, pp. 102-103, "(I had a little monkey)," "(Mother, mother, I am ill)" (2 texts)
Sackett/Koch-KansasFolklore, pp. 224-225, "Mother, Mother" (1 text)
Sutton-Smith-NZ-GamesOfNewZealandChilden/FolkgamesOfChildren, p. 110, "(Mother, Mother, I feel ill)," "(Granny, Granny, I am ill)" (2 texts)
Abernethy-SinginTexas, p. 14, "("Mother, mother, I feel ill)" (1 text)
Pankake/Pankake-PrairieHomeCompanionFolkSongBook, p. 213, "Jump Rope Rhyme" (1 text)
Solomon-ZickaryZan, pp. 57-58, "Tiny Tim" (1 text); p. 61, "Momma, Momma"; "Quick, Quick, Quick"; "Will I Die?"; p. 63, "Alligator Purse";p. 103, "Tim" (5 texts)
Ainsworth-JumpRopeVerses, #4, "(Had a little duck, His name was Tony Pim)"; #35, "(I had a little monkey dressed in red)"; #68, "(Had a little Teddy bear, His name was Tiny Tim)"; #90, "(Minnie, Minnie Ha Ha)"; #107, "(Mother, Mother, I am ill)"; #123, "(Mother, Mother, I am sick)" ; #127, "(Mother, Mother, I feel sick)"; #130, "(I had a little brother, His name was Tim)" (7 texts)
Delamar-ChildrensCountingOutRhymes, pp. 61-62, "My Monkey" (1 text); p. 125, "Mother, Mother, I Feel Sick" (1 text)
Brady-AllInAllIn, p. 82, "(Mother, Mother, I feel sick)" (1 text)
Peirce-KeepTheKettleBoiling, p. 26, "(Granny, Granny, I am sick)" (1 short text)
Abrahams-JumpRopeRhymes, #224, "I had a little brother"; #353, "Mother, mother, I am ill (sick)" (2 text)
MidwestFolklore, Vance Randolph, "Jump Rope Rhymes From Arkansas" Volume 3, Number 2 (Summer 1953), pp. 82-83, "(Mother, mother, I am sick)"; p. 83, "(Mamma, mamma, I am sick"; "(Mother, mother, I am sick)"; ("Mother, mother, I am ill)" (4 texts)
ADDITIONAL: Peter and Iona Opie, _I Saw Esau: Traditional Rhymes of Youth_, #77, "(Mother, Mother, I Am Ill)" (1 text, with the first few lines of this song although the ending is different)
Roud #13502 and 4835
RECORDINGS:
Travis Johnson, "Miss Susie" (Piotr-Archive #515, recorded 03/08/2023)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "I Am a Pretty Little Dutch Girl" (tune, per Opie/Opie-TheSingingGame)
cf. "Oh Dear Mother" (some lines: "Doctor, doctor will I die?")
NOTES [187 words]: See Sandburg, American Songbag pp .378-379 and the other "Bang Away, Lulu (I)" songs, Roud #8349. I think this is too much a game song to be lumped with bawdy #8349 (even so innocent a version as Sandburg's). - BS
And I agree, and have filed accordingly. Roud also files some of the lyrics in McIntosh-FolkSongsAndSingingGamesofIllinoisOzarks with Roud #4835. The whole thing is a mess. Although the "Johnsons had a baby" text often includes the "Mother, mother, I am ill" bit (Sackett/Koch-KansasFolklore give this as:"Mother, mother, I am ill, Call the doctor from over the hill. In comes the doctor, In comes the nurse, In comes the lady With the alligator purse"), it also circulates separately. I wonder if they aren't separate pieces that combined.
We use the title "The Johnsons Had a Baby" because the Opies do, but it's a very bad name, since it is very rare. Whereas Abrahams-JumpRopeRhymes lists fifty sources for "Mother, Mother, I am Sick" types. It's pretty clear that is more common.
Gershon Legman thought the "alligator purse" might be derived from a fairy in Lucretia P. Haley's The Peterkin Papers. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.8
File: OpGa147

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