# Where did the "woodchuck chuck" tongue twister come from? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 5, 2011, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611 "2011-03-05T19:59:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CheeseDonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@CheeseDonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CheeseDonkey)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/1 "2011-03-05T19:59:44Z")
I have heard that the origins of the “woodchuck chuck” tongue twister are unknown. Is this completely true? My research indicates that its been around since about the early 1900s. Can anyone shed any light on its true origins? ---
**Author:** ![bahia\_hombre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@bahia\_hombre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bahia_hombre)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/2 "2012-05-07T01:02:36Z")
I can’t, but here’s another one I heard recently: “I am a mother pheasant plucker, I pluck mother pheasants. I am the best mother pheasant plucker that ever plucked a mother pheasant.” (5 times fast) ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/3 "2012-05-07T05:40:41Z")
> [@bahia\_hombre](#): > > I can’t, but here’s another one I heard recently: > > “I am a mother pheasant plucker, I pluck mother pheasants. I am the best mother pheasant plucker that ever plucked a mother pheasant.” > > (5 times fast) You got it wrong - I’m not the pleasant pheasant plucker, I’m the pleasant pheasant plucker’s son So I sitting her plucking pleasant pheasants, till the pleasant pheasant plucker comes. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/4 "2012-05-07T07:36:05Z")
> [@bengangmo](#): > > You got it wrong - > > I’m not the pleasant pheasant plucker, > I’m the pleasant pheasant plucker’s son > So I sitting her plucking pleasant pheasants, > till the pleasant pheasant plucker comes. Delete “pleasant” throughout, and that’s more or less the way I learned it, with a simple little tune to go with it, and a second verse. Thus: I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s son, And I’m only plucking pheasants 'til the pheasant plucker comes. I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s mate, And I’m only plucking pheasants 'cos the pheasant plucker’s late. ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/5 "2012-05-07T08:03:14Z")
In answer to the OP (which is over a year old) the tongue twister came from\* [Fay Templeton’s Woodchuck Song](http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/fa-spnc/id/45016/rec/3)\*, by Theodore F. Morse and Robert H. Davis, Copyright 1903. It was a blackface/Vaudeville-style song (i.e. racist and corny) performed in a Broadway production called _The Runaways_. It was later recorded by [Ragtime Bob Roberts](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-3DpgckiLA) in 1904. The original lyrics: There am heaps of knowledge in old Yale college, and in Harvard University. But I ain’t yet found, no where around, not even down in Tuskegee, a full fledged college graduate what could right off-hand elucidate, or any where’s near stipulate to me: [chorus] I’se a strong suspicion, a supposition, that some white man surely ought to know. Fo’ when I shout, der ain’t no doubt I’m heard clean out to Chicago. Where dose professors speculate, and figure and anticipate, and git right down and calculate to show: [chorus] I’se an intimation dat education am something everyone don’t sell. But I’m de moke what tried to soak dis woodchuck joke on old Cornell. Dem students couldn’t regulate, on dis hear problem complicate, you ought to seen dem hesitate to tell: [chorus] Chorus: How much wood would a woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck would chuck wood? And how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck only could? If a woodchuck could make good and would, but there ain’t no reason why he should, but how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck would chuck wood? ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/7 "2012-05-07T09:01:27Z")
You sure that’s the origin, and not just a coopting of the tongue twister? I know of a more recent song that also have those lyrics, and I know they came from the tongue twister. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/8 "2012-05-07T09:25:06Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > Delete “pleasant” throughout, and that’s more or less the way I learned it, with a simple little tune to go with it, and a second verse. Thus: > > I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s son, > And I’m only plucking pheasants 'til the pheasant plucker comes. > I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s mate, > And I’m only plucking pheasants 'cos the pheasant plucker’s late. yeah - I actually learnt it without the pleasant - but the addition makes it that much harder… Makes an awesome drinking game (everytime you get it wrong, must drink) then of course you also have Mrs. Fuddy Duddy and her flat cut punt. ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/9 "2012-05-07T09:44:39Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > You sure that’s the origin, and not just a coopting of the tongue twister? I know of a more recent song that also have those lyrics, and I know they came from the tongue twister. Sure as online searching can be, unless anyone can help find an earlier cite. It might have been inspired by something similar already in popular use at the time but if so there isn’t any easily found record of it. At the least this is the earliest copyrighted work with that chorus. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Mondegreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/91b2a8/32.png) [@Lord\_Mondegreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Mondegreen)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/10 "2012-05-07T10:07:17Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > Delete “pleasant” throughout, and that’s more or less the way I learned it, with a simple little tune to go with it, and a second verse. Thus: > > I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s son, > And I’m only plucking pheasants 'til the pheasant plucker comes. > I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s mate, > And I’m only plucking pheasants 'cos the pheasant plucker’s late. [The Barrow Poets, the Pheasant Plucker’s Song](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m09eEgy2Zhk) ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2012, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/11 "2012-05-07T17:47:29Z")
I first heard it as: “I ain’t a fig plucker, I’m a fig plucker’s son…” ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/12 "2012-05-08T00:40:04Z")
> [@CheeseDonkey](#): > > I have heard that the origins of the “woodchuck chuck” tongue twister are unknown. Is this completely true? My research indicates that its been around since about the early 1900s. Can anyone shed any light on its true origins? > [@Crazyhorse](#): > > In answer to the OP (which is over a year old) the tongue twister came from\* [Fay Templeton’s Woodchuck Song](http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/fa-spnc/id/45016/rec/3)\*, by Theodore F. Morse and Robert H. Davis, Copyright 1903. It was a blackface/Vaudeville-style song (i.e. racist and corny) performed in a Broadway production called _The Runaways_. It was later recorded by [Ragtime Bob Roberts](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-3DpgckiLA) in 1904. While Miss Tempelton did perform this in late 1903, it appeared in early 1902 in a few newspaper articles. I can supply about five upon request. Two of those articles suggested it was a long-ago remembered nursery song/rhyme. Whether that is true, I can’t say. But it hit the newspapers at least a year before it became a Broadway song. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/13 "2012-05-08T01:23:04Z")
“I ain’t the sheet slitter, I’m the sheet slitter’s son…” ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/14 "2012-05-08T03:13:27Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > While Miss Tempelton did perform this in late 1903, it appeared in early 1902 in a few newspaper articles. I can supply about five upon request. Two of those articles suggested it was a long-ago remembered nursery song/rhyme. Whether that is true, I can’t say. But it hit the newspapers at least a year before it became a Broadway song. Thank you **samclem**. If anyone could dig up an earlier cite I thought it would probably be you. While searching a little more after posting, I came across [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=456324)at a website that specializes in this kind of thing and had addressed the topic 4 years ago. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![UncleFred](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f0a364/32.png) [@UncleFred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleFred)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/15 "2012-05-08T12:50:53Z")
Regarding the OP, I don’t know her name but it was written by some lady, who I think lived near the ocean. She had a small business selling something. I forget what. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/16 "2012-05-08T13:48:30Z")
I learned a parody of this tongue twister a number of years ago. It went something like: “How much whey would a Zimbabwe if a zimbab [whatever that is…] could weigh whey?” ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/17 "2012-05-08T16:39:53Z")
Also a very long story about Peter the little pit viper who kept telling his mummy he wanted to hiss and being told “Don’t hiss in the pit; if you want to hiss, go over to Mrs Potts’s pit and hiss”… and eventually being sent home by a cross Mrs Potts, on which mummy sniffs that she remembers when Mrs Potts didn’t have a pit to hiss in. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/18 "2012-05-08T18:15:07Z")
> [@cochrane](#): > > “I ain’t the sheet slitter, I’m the sheet slitter’s son…” or: “I slit a sheet. A sheet I slit. Upon a slitted sheet I sit.” . ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/where-did-the-woodchuck-chuck-tongue-twister-come-from/573611/19 "2012-05-08T18:51:12Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > Also a very long story about Peter the little pit viper who kept telling his mummy he wanted to hiss and being told “Don’t hiss in the pit; if you want to hiss, go over to Mrs Potts’s pit and hiss”… and eventually being sent home by a cross Mrs Potts, on which mummy sniffs that she remembers when Mrs Potts didn’t have a pit to hiss in. Hi Mrs Potts! I’ve come to vipe your vindows!