WYSIWG, thank you. Nice to be in such good company.

Q, I'm not sure where the name "Flower" came from in relation to the song "Green Sally Up".

I've learned from my "Jim Along Josie" experience not to state something with assurance unless I'm really sure. Notice how I try to qualify my supposings with "maybes", "could bes" and "IMOs".

{Remember when I said that a josie was a woman's undergarment? That erroneous statement was circulated all around the Mudcat Cafe and the Internet and may still be... So, one more time, I was wrong...A josie is a joseph is a woman's riding coat..)

This of course has very little to do with "Flower" as a name for Green Sally, Up.

But I wonder, isn't there an old British folk rhyme called Wallflower? And doesn't that rhyme mention death? Green Sally mentions death. Is there any connection between these two rhymes?

Could "Green Sally" be the name of a greenish flower growing near a wall? Probably not.

But, just for the heck of it, here's what is "probably" a variant of the Wallflower children's rhyme. This girl/boy ring game with one person in the center is from from Altona Trent John's 1944 book "Playsongs of the Deep South."

WATER-FLOWER
Water-flower, water-flower,
Growing up so tall,
All the young ladies must surely, surely die;
All except Miss 'Lindy Watkins,
She is everywhere,-
The white folks say, the white folks say,
Turn your back and tell your beau's name.

Doctor, Doctor can you tell
What will make poor 'Lindy well?
She is sick and 'bout to die,
That will make poor Johnnie cry!

Marry, marry, marry, quick!
'Lindy, you are just love sick!

Johnnie is a ver' nice man,
Comes to the door with hat in hand,
Pulls off his gloves and show his rings,
'Morrow is the wedding-day.
---

So this may not have anything to do with Green Sally Up. It certainly has nothing to do with Wade in the Water, which after all is the name of this thread- except that flowers need water...and so Green Sally has to travel upstream to go wading....

Never mind...