George Clinton/Parliament Funkadelic Is Probably The Source Of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity's Nasty Parody Of The "Old Mother Hubbard" Nursery Rhyme

Edited by Azizi Powell

This is Part I of a two part pancocojams series on Omega Psi Phi Fraternity's "Old Mother Hubbard" chant.

This post presents information about what I believe is the probable source for Omega Psi Phi Fraternity's parody of the "Old Mother Hubbard" Nursery rhyme.

Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2026/02/examples-of-omega-psi-phi-fraternity.html for Part II of this pancocojams series. That post presents some video examples and some word only examples of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity's parodies of the "Old Mother Hubbard" nursery rhyme. That post also provides my sense of what I think are the purposes of that fraternity chant.

WARNING - These pancocojams posts on parodies of "Old Mother Hubbard" rhymes aren't suitable for children.

The content of this post is presented for historical, folkloric, and socio-cultural purposes. 

All copyrights remain with their owners.

Thanks to all those who created these "Old Mother Hubbard" parodies and thanks to all those who are quoted in this post.
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Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2015/03/examples-of-historically-black_53.html for Part 5 of a seven part pancocojams series of examples of historically Black fraternity and sorority chants and songs that begin with O-R.

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PANCOCOJAMS EDITOR'S STATEMENT
I believe that historically Black Greek letter fraternity and sorority chants and songs are part of African American culture. As such. examples of these chants and songs should be collected, documented, and studied. 

However, in adherence with the guidelines of historically Black Greek letter fraternities and sororities, these songs and chants should only be performed by people who are associated with the specific organizations where these chants and songs come from.

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A STANDARD EXAMPLE OF OMEGA PSI PHI FRATERNITY'S "OLD MOTHER HUBBARD" CHANT

OH MOTHER HUBBARD
caller-Hey Ques
group -Yeah
caller -Hey Ques
group -Yeah
caller -I say Ques
group- Yeah
caller -You nasty dogs
group -Yeah)
(all chant together) 
I saida
Old Mother Hubbard
Went to the cupboard
To fetch her Que dog a bone.
But when she bent over,
Rover took over,
'Cause he had a bone of his own.

He was a nasty nasty 
Que dog
He was a nasty nasty
Que dog
-JonyMatt, Feb 13, 2012 "This Is Alpha Chapter, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMereD1542I [4:33-5:30 in that song file & photo collage--

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TIME LINE OF MY SEARCH (THUS FAR) FOR THE SOURCE OF OMEGA PSI PHI FRATERNITY'S "OLD MOTHER HUBBARD" CHANT 

On February 17, 2026 I revisited this pancocojams page about historically Black Greek letter fraternity and sorority chants and songs https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2015/03/examples-of-historically-black_53.html "Examples beginning with O-R".

That page includes an example of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity's
Old Mother Hubbard" chant. After reading that page, I decided to do a deep dive for the source of that fraternity chant. 

Here's a summary of my search as of February 23, 2026

-Dec 01, 2001 - comment from catspaw49, http://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=41824 "Nasty Nursery Rhymes" by catspaw49 on Dec 01, 2001 [This is an excerpt of that comment. The first example given is a version of "Jack Be Nimble" that in includes the word "di-k".]

"Well, they ain't exactly circulating on the schoolyards, but for sheer stupid and nasty, it's hard to beat Andrew "Dice" Clay with immortals like ...

The only one of his that I know for a fact WAS making the schoolyard rounds at least 40 years ago is a bit different than listed there. I remember it quite well:

Old Mother Hubbard

Went to the cupboard

To fetch her poor dog a bone.

But when she bent over,

Rover came over,

And he had a bone of his own."

-snip-

I was an active member of Mudcat from August 2005 until November 2014.

Catspaw is a White American male. The standup comedian Andrew "Dice" Clay is also a White American male.

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- February 17, 2026 - I read Andrew "Dice" Clay's Wikipedia page. Here's an excerpt from that   page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Dice_Clay

"Andrew Clay Silverstein (born September 29, 1957)[1] known professionally as Andrew Dice Clay is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He rose to prominence in the late 1980s with a brash, deliberately offensive persona known as "The Diceman", a cartoonishly hyper-masculine, Italian-American street-tough caricature that claimed to weaponise misogyny, ethnic bravado, and shock but caused widespread offense.[2][3]

[…]

In September 1989, Clay performed a three-minute set to introduce Cher, at the 1989 MTV Video Music Awards, which included Otto Petersen's adult versions of the Mother Goose nursery rhymes. The incident led to MTV imposing a lifetime ban on Clay from appearing on the network.[23] The ban was lifted in 2011.…
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I added italics to highlight this sentence.

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- February 17, 2026  I read Otto Petersen's Wikipedia page. Here's the beginning paragraph of that  page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Petersen
"Otto Sol Petersen (July 29, 1960 – April 13, 2014) was an American ventriloquist, comedian, and actor known for his act Otto and George, which he performed with his dummy George Dudley.[1] Petersen began performing with George as a street act in Manhattan and Brooklyn in the early 1970s. In the late 1970s the act moved into night clubs and began to evolve into an "X-rated" act."...

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- February 17, 2026. I read this reddit.com discussion thread: 
https://www.reddit.com/r/comedy/comments/1n69utt/who_did_the_diceman_steal_his_whole_nursery_rhyme/ "Who did the diceman steal his whole nursery rhyme routine from?"

Here are some comments from that discussion thread (with numbers added for referencing purposes only. These numbers aren't the same as the numbers that were assigned in that discussion thread.

#1. QuiltedMonk, 2025
"Sadly can't remember where or when, but believe it was randomly on the radio one day I heard an older recording (60s or 70s) of a black comedian I did not recognize their voice doing word for word the Dice-man's signature Nursery Rhyme Routine. And the small club was going WILD. It was obviously a recording way before Dice's stadium era and I was floored when I heard it.

Sadly didn't follow up at the time, but I'm listening to a Youtube Essay about Dice wigging out at Jay Mohr about stealing a phrase, and wanted to revisit this.

Sadly can't seem to find anything online and wondering why this isn't more known... Does anybody know who the original comedian was and where a recording can be found? You'd be my hero if you do "

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2.  LegendarySmokeStory, 2025
"I've heard it in recording of George Clinton and the Parliament Funkadelic from 1976.

https://youtu.be/r5aHD5ruSZ0?si=SMSnGwnq572jxpBz&t=768

"Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet, snorting some THC. Along came a spider, slid down beside her, said What's in the bag bi-ch?"*
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*This word is fully spelled out in this comment.

The YouTube link that is given in that comment is for "Parliament Funkadelic - The Mothership Connection (Live in Houston, TX, 1976), published by AM FUNK, Apr 17, 2017

I don't know where in that video the "Old Mother Hubbard" verse is given.  

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3. QuiltedMonk OP,2025
"Thank you thank you! We've officially gotten one step further down the rabbit hole."

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4. LegendarySmokeStory, 2025
"I've wondered about this same thing. I love the Parliament concert linked above and have listened to it 100 times over 20 years. But i only recently realized it's similarity to Dice's bit and how it came before.

What else have you uncovered in this investigation? I'm also very interested."

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5. QuiltedMonk OP, 2025
"The Parliament Clip is the best piece of evidence so far. Looking into Blowfly's stuff for a minute and couldn't find any straight standup. All the recordings were with a band.

Next step is finding out where the local old heads hang out and see if I can quiz some elders."

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6.  Ok-Fun-8586, 2025
"Check out “Take Your Dead Ass Home” from them too. Limericks, but same vibe."
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That redditt,com discussion thread has some other comments about the possible sources for these nasty nursey rhymes including these comments:

#7. 11cutandshuffle23,2025
"Rudy Ray Moore?"

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#8. Jackalope_Sasquatch, 2025
"That's who I thought of immediately..."

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9. QuiltedMonk OP, 2025
"Who I thought maybe but it was definitely a different voice."
-snip-
Another commenter asked if the Black comedian the original poster heard could have been Nipsey Russel and another commenter asked if that Black comedian could have been Red Foxx. However, the original poster didn't comment about those names. 

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10. Cum Trumpet, 2025
"Otto Peterson, of Otto and George.

He mentioned it on Opie and Anthony, and Ron and Fez, and on Jay Morhs shows when he was alive.

The bit makes a lot more sense for a puppet act, no?"
-snip-
The word "he" in this comment appears to be a referent for White American comedian/ventriloquist Otto Peterson.

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11. Chuffer/Nutters, 2025
"When Dice was hige* and I was 14 I played him for my dad. My dad said about the nursery rhymes that he heard them many years ago, or when he was a kid."
-snip-
*Hige" is probably a typo for "huge" 

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12. Technical_Moose8478, February 21, 2026
"Otto Petersen. He was a ventriloquist who originally wrote and performed the dirty nursery rhymes bit. He wasn't black, though."
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This is the last comment in that discussion thread as of February 23. 2026. 

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Please share any information that you have about source of the Omega Psi Phi Fraternity's "Old Mother Hubbard" chant or any memories of when and where you first chanted that parody or first heard it chanted. Thanks in advance!

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This concludes Part I of this two part pancocojams series.

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