Lewiston [Me.] Journal (Dec. 20, 1958):

"The vaudeville...show was a great success and they laughed uproariously over a song telling how 'A fly flew into a grocery store,
A place he'd never been before!'"

New Teller (York, Neb.) (July 3, 1940):

"Someone ...[wrote] a parody of 'The Bowery"...like this:

    A fly flew into a grocery store,
    He'd only been there once before,
    He sit on the sugar, he sit on the ham,
    He didn't give a dam for the grocery man.    [sic


Sun-Democrat (Paducah, Ky) (Oct. 7, 1932):

Do You Remember Way Back When?...Four midgets exhibited at the Opera House, about 1885. Tom Thumb and Minnie Warren were two of them. They sang:

    A fly flew into a grocery store,
    It lit on the counter, it lit on the floor,
    It lit on the bacon, it lit on the ham;
    And it darned near lit on the grocery man.

Kennewick [Wash.] Courier (June 21, 1912):

    The fly flew into the grocery store,
    He flew right in through the old screen door;
    He lit on the cheese and he lit on the ham
    And he wiped his feet on the grocery man.


Great Bend [Kans.] Tribune (Oct. 5, 1911):

"A jaybird few into a grocery store, flew right in at the open door and lit on the sugar and lit on the ham and didn't give a [damn] for the pure food man."

Nashville American (June 2, 1907):

"A Little Fly flew in a grocery store;
Of course you have heard all that before."

Montreal Star (Jan. 11, 1894) [ad]:

    A fly flew into a grocery store
    And lit on ...A BOTTLE OF GRAY'S SYRUP.