The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #62841 Message #1258173
Posted By: Jim Dixon
27-Aug-04 - 09:38 AM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Grandma's Lysol? / Grandma's Lye Soap
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Grandma's Lysol
Lye soap was generally a homemade product. My own grandmother made it. Traditionally, lye was extracted from fireplace ashes by passing rainwater through it. Later, lye pellets could be bought in a can. Soap was made by mixing lye with rendered fat from a slaughtered animal. Lye + fat (or oil) is still the basic formula for soap (not to be confused with detergent).
Lysol is a commercial brand of "all purpose cleaner." I guess the brand name was invented to sound like "lye soap."
The song was GRANDMA'S LYE SOAP. "Grandma's Lysol" is a mishearing influenced by the fact that, by the 1950s, "Lysol" was a more familiar term that "lye soap"!
Anyway, the song comes from a popular comedy record by Johnny Standley called "It's in the Book" (1952) which incorporated the song. The whole performance was a spoof of a revivalist church service. The first part was a "sermon" using "Little Bo Peep" as the text, and the second part was the "hymn" GRANDMA'S LYE SOAP.