Acka-backa, soda cracker

[Jonathan Lighter]

Wilson Gray <wilson.gray at RCN.COM> wrote:

. . .

It's an interesting coincidence that two different chants both include
a very similar line that kinda blows up the rhythm of each chant.

********************************************************************************

"There was an old man of Milan
Whose verses never would scan.
He said, "As a poet,
My fault, and I know it,
Is that I always try to get as many words into the very last line as I possibly can."

--Anon., with the middle lines by JL because I can't remember the originals.

JL


---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: Acka-backa, soda cracker
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I knew only the "Catch-a-Jap" version of Eenie Meenie. But, now that I
see your version of it, Larr, I'm reminded that the version that I
learned of Acka-Backa had, after the ethnic slur, a line:

My mother told me to pick the very best one
O-U-T spells out goes YOU!


-Wilson


On Jan 29, 2005, at 10:39 AM, Mark A. Mandel wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: "Mark A. Mandel"
> Subject: Re: Acka-backa, soda cracker
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> Laurence Horn said:
>>>>
> Curious the way these choosing rituals incorporated ethnic slurs. In
> our neighborhood (Washington Heights, NYC, c. 1950) it was always
>
> Eenie meenie meinie moe
> Catch a tiger by the toe
> If he hollers let him go
> My mother said to pick this very one
> Y-O-U spells you
>
>
> <<<
>
> NYC,fifties: same except that the last line was "out goes Y-O-U".
>
>
> mark by hand
>


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