meaning: Sam Stone 'Little Pitchers have big ears'

Subject: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: Bugsy
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 03:33 AM

I'm revisiting some John Prine songs, and am wondering about the meaning of a line in the song "Sam Stone"
"Little Pitchers have big ears"

Is he refering to Kids,( little baseball pitchers) or small jugs?
when i first heard the song, I heard "Little Pictures"

Any ideas?

Cheers

Bugsy

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 05:32 AM

Dictionary.com Little pitchers have big ears

Adults must be careful about what they say within the hearing of children. The saying refers to the large handles (ears) sometimes attached to small vessels.

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 10:02 AM

From the Fortune database (slightly amended):

Children seldom misquote you. In fact, they usually repeat word for
word what you should never have said in the first place.

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: meself
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 11:00 AM

I never heard that "saying", and still haven't, outside the song. Is "Little pitchers have big ears" a saying that anyone else is familiar with, outside the song?

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: cnd
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 12:04 PM

The phrase gets over 7,000 hits on a Newspapers.com search of the US. Particularly hot spots for results were in New York (511), Kansas (476), Pennsylvania (437), California (430), Ohio (371), Nebraska (357), Missouri (313), Indiana (307), and Oklahoma (306), with usage not being particularly consistent from year to year; instead, the phrase would lie dormant for decades at a time until reiterated in a widely-syndicated or published poem or article every 50 years or so -- 1887 (227 hits), 1913 (240 hits), 1917 (196 hits), 1922 (210 hits), 1931 (188 hits), 1941 (226 hits), 1950 (222 hits), 1982 (205 hits), 2005/2006 (211/193 hits). Heyday was definitely from about 1920-1970.

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: Robert B. Waltz
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 12:11 PM

meself asks: I never heard that "saying", and still haven't, outside the song. Is "Little pitchers have big ears" a saying that anyone else is familiar with, outside the song?

Absolutely. In fact, the saying is so familiar that, it seems to me, one rarely hears it completed. The usual way it's used is to say "Little pitchers" and point -- often with the head rather than the hand, because it's less obvious that way.

Looking at cnd's list, I wonder if it might not be something of a midwesternism (I'm in Minnesota, and my family came from Michigan). Known outside the American Midwest, of course, but perhaps more common here.

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: meself
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 12:27 PM

Interesting!

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 12:28 PM

I was born in Detroit and grew up in Wisconsin, in a family with five kids. My parents used that phrase ALL THE TIME....   ;-)

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 06:40 PM

Thanks, everyone.
You've solved my dilemma ??.

Cheers

Bugsy

Subject: RE: meaning: SAM STONE 'LITTLE PITCHERS'
From: cnd
Date: 17 Mar 25 - 08:20 PM

At the risk of putting my Southern bona fide at risk, I've never heard the phrase.

Subject: RE: meaning: Sam Stone 'Little Pitchers have big ears'
From: GUEST,Thebarleymow
Date: 19 Mar 25 - 08:47 AM

My understanding was simply that “little pitchers” refers to a slang term for children who throw or pitch when playing baseball. All children have “big ears” in that they regularly overhear adult conversations.
Simple!

Subject: RE: meaning: Sam Stone 'Little Pitchers have big ears'
From: rich-joy
Date: 19 Mar 25 - 07:52 PM

Strangely Bugsy, I recall the saying from my childhood - and my Nanna who used it was West Aussie born-and-bred!!!

R-J :)

Subject: RE: meaning: Sam Stone 'Little Pitchers have big ears'
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 20 Mar 25 - 02:33 AM

I heard it a lot while parents were working in the kitchen and I was around. I later attributed it to Pennsylvania Dutch expressions.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

conversation would switch to spelling out conversation or "pig-latin."