The Oldest Joke You Remember

I know first exact three jokes that were told to me and that registered in my small brain:

Q. Why did the man bring a ladder to the baseball game? A. The Giants were playing!

Q. Why did the man bring a ladder to church? A. It was a High Mass.

Q. Why did the man throw butter out the window? A. He wanted to see the butter fly.
When my son was just old enough to ‘get’ jokes, I told him the first and last ones from above. I don’t think anyone knows what a high mass is anymore.

Dirty Joke
Two white horses fell in the mud and three came out

Had no idea why that was a joke…

Though too long and funny to reproduce in full, the first one I remember (from about 1957) concerned a lion named Herman who ate up a family one by one (naughty, naughty Herman.) At the end the family is back. What happened? Herman burped.

The second was about a person calling, saying “I am viper - I will come in one week” and so on until it gets to a few minutes. Then a person shows up and says “I am the viper, do you want your vindows vashed?”

Is there a “that’s not funny” smiley around?

Two earliest ones I recall are:

“I’ll tell you a joke, a bottle of coke.”

“Spell hive without the e.”
“h, i, v.”
“Are you positive?”

I heard those as monster-oriented jokes, e.g.,

Mommy, mommy, what’s a werewolf?
Shut up and comb your face!

Mommy, mommy, what’s a vampire?
Shut up and eat your soup before it clots.

When I was two, (My mom has my delivery of it, dated, on a casette tape somewhere) my favorite joke was Groucho’s, “I wanted to be a doctor, but I didn’t have the patience! (patients)” Weird joke for a two year old…and I told it all. the. time.

The other one I remember is not so much a joke, but a neat thing to memorize for the holidays. It came out of a book called “The Lip smackin’, Joke Crackin’, Cookbook for Kids” Which is a really bitchin’ kids book if you can get a hold of it.

On with the show:
May children who setsel
all nug in beir theds
Have hisions of pluger sums
thance binder neds.

Thank yew! Thank yew! I’ll be here all week, enjoy the buffet, and don’t forget to tip yer waitress!

Ok, sick humor of kids:
A teacher called roll on the first day of school. She asked if she had missed anyone and a little girl in a pink dress raised her hand.

“What is your name, dear?”

“Happy Butt.”

Shocked, the teacher sent the child to the principal. The principal smiled and said, “and what is your name?”

“Happy Butt.”

The principal frowned and said, “young lady, I seriously doubt your name is that. What is your last name?”

The little girl cocked her head inquisitively. “Jenkins.”

The principal looked in his book of registered students and said, “aaahhh. There you are…Jenkins. But your name isn’t what you told me it was. It is in fact, Gladys.”

The little girl smiled. “Well, Happy Butt. Glad Ass. Same difference.”
Yes, I thought it was the funniest thing I had ever heard.

Kindergarten…1969.

“I bet I can make you speak Indian language.”
“How?”
“See?!”

My dad had an old 45 that presented it this way:

“Be kind to your web-footed friends
For a duck may be somebody’s brother.
Be kind to the denizen of the swamp;
He’s a dilly through and through.
You may think that this is the end,
But it isn’t 'cause there’s another chorus.”

Further interest: The book .

I need some help remembering. You’ll have to be older than most to have a clue, unless the joke lasted a long time.

I already mentioned the Little Moron. The joke had something to do with a medicine cabinet.

There was another one with a pun (of sorts) on Washington.

And one more had to do with putting a cough drop on a coffin, but that may have been a ghost story.

Coming down with CRS, I reckon.

Hey I remember that one, and it was a great joke! You have to tell it like a horror story though and not a Joke. So its about a woman who freaks out hearing on the phone that a Viper is coming to get her each day, and she dreads it more and more, until at the very end you have him show up to vipe ze vindows! :stuck_out_tongue:

I remember it as a quick joke too, but here’s the story of that one that I found with a bit of Googling:
*
A man was walking home alone late one night when he hears a BUMP…
BUMP… BUMP… behind him.

Walking faster he looks back, and makes out the image of an upright
coffin banging its way down the middle of the street towards him … BUMP…
BUMP… BUMP…

Terrified, the man begins to run towards his home, the coffin bouncing
quickly behind him … faster… faster… BUMP… BUMP… BUMP…

He runs up to his door, fumbles with his keys, opens the door, rushes
in, slams and locks the door behind him. However, the coffin crashes
through his door, with the lid of the coffin clapping … clappity-BUMP…
clappity-BUMP… clappity-BUMP… on the heels of the terrified man.

Rushing upstairs to the bathroom, the man locks himself in. His heart
is pounding; his head is reeling; his breath is coming in sobbing gasps.
With a loud CRASH the coffin breaks down the door. Bumping and clapping
towards him.

The man screams and reaches for something, anything … but all he can
find is a box of cough drops! Desperate, he throws the cough drops at the
coffin … and lo and behold the coffin stops!*

“Stop messing about with that, you’ll have someones eye out”

King Harold, 1066

Well told. That’s close enough to the foggy remnants in my brain to be how I must have heard it. If any variations, they’re minor.

TDN I can’t believe I fell for that stupid joke.
::writes it down to tell it later::

Why did the Little Moron tiptoe past the medicine cabinet? He didn’t want to wake up the sleeping pills.

That’s one of the earliest ones I remember as well.

Hey, 40 years after first hearing it, I still love it.

Here’s on for you – read the following list of words, but say the word “trains” before each word. Say it aloud.

Trains
About
Talk
Fool
This
Made
I
How
Look

Now read it again, but say the word “trains” AFTER each word.

Now read it again, but say the word “trains” before AND after each word.

Now read this list from the bottom up.

Oh I have been looking for someone who remembers this joke. My mom used to tell me and I remember telling my kids but have since forgotten it. Can you please help me?

I liked elephant jokes.

Why do ducks have webbed feet?
To stamp out forest fires.

Why do elephants have flat feet?
To stamp out flaming ducks.

Knock Knock
Who’s there?
Orange
Orange who?
Orange you going to open the door and let me in?

I’ve always had a low opinion of knock knock jokes.