"Sippin Cider" is an echo song where the "leader" sings each line and then the "group" repeats each line. Then at the end of each verse the whole group sings the whole verse together.

This is the same tune and exactly the same type of song as The Littlest Worm. Given that they both involve sipping from a straw, I'd imagine one is based on the other.

Sippin' Cider (The Prettiest Girl) - American Children's Songs - The USA - Mama Lisa's World: Children's Songs and Rhymes from Around the World - Intro Image

Notes

*Alternate verse:

And now I've got
A mother-in-law
And nineteen kids
That call me "Paw" (or "Maw").

This song can be found as "Sucking cider" in "American Songbag" (1927) compiled by Carl Sandburg. In that version every instance of "sipping" is replaced by "sucking".

Comments

Composed by Carey Morgan and Lee David in 1919.

Listen

Nancy sent the following recording with the note:

"I have more verses for you for a different version. We sang this in junior high school while we were on field trips in the early 1960s in Northern New Jersey..."

The prettiest girl I ever saw
was sippin' cider through a straw.
(Repeat)

I said to her, "What you doin' that for
a sippin' cider through a straw?"
(Repeat)

She said to me, "Why don't you know
that sippin' cider's all I know?"
(Repeat)

Now 28 kids all call me paw
from sippin' cider through a straw.
(Repeat)

This is the end. There ain't no more
of sippin' cider through a straw.
(Repeat)

Download

Many thanks to Nancy Membrez for singing "The Prettiest Girl" for us!

Thanks and Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Gracie Gralike for the illustration.

Thanks so much!