I remember as a young girl both my mother and my grandmother singing the song “Mairzy Doats” to me at bedtime. A silly nonsense song, “Mairzy Doats” was most likely the first mondegreen I heard, although I didn’t know it as a mondegreen at the time. Heck, I didn’t even know what the word meant.

“Mairzy Doats” was written in 1943 by Al Hoffman, Milton Drake and Jerry Livingston as a novelty song. Al Trace and his Silly Symphonists first played the song on a New York radio station, and the version of the song recorded by the Merry Macs reached number one in March of 1944. Since then, numerous recording artists have recorded the song, and “Mairzy Doats” has also appeared as music in movies and television shows.

It’s said that the song was so popular that American soldiers used the nonsense words as passwords during World War II.

The words to “Mairzy Doats”, if you see them written, make no sense at all. Mairzy doats and dozy doats and liddle lamzy divey, a kiddley divey too, wouldn’t you? What the heck? However, if you listen to the song, the bridge to the refrain gives you a clue to what they are actually saying. Mares eat oats, and does eat oats, and little lambs eat ivy. A kid’ll eat ivy too, wouldn’t you?

“Mairzy Doats” was inspired by Milton Drake’s daughter, who, at four years of age, came home from school one day singing an English nursery rhyme. The nursery rhyme went “cowzy tweet and sowzy tweet and liddle sharksy doisters” which translates into “cows eat wheat and sows eat wheat and little sharks eat oysters”.

However you say it, “Mairzy Doats” is a fun song to sing. Watch this version of "Mairzy Doats" from the Lawrence Welk Show.