Timothy Grady
Poor little Timothy Grady
Screwed up his face at a lady,
And, jiminy jack!
It wouldn’t come back.
The louder he hollered
The tighter it grew,
His eyes are all red
And his lips are all blue.
Oh, mercy me, what in the world will he do?
Poor little Timothy Grady!
First published in The Peter Patter Book of Nursery Rhymes (1918).
Every child’s been warned not to make faces — and here’s the rhyme that proves why. Timothy Grady takes that old bit of grown-up advice and turns it into a winter comedy. One fateful grimace, and the poor boy’s stuck with it — frozen, quite literally, by the cold and his own mischief.
The humor works on two levels. Kids laugh because it’s ridiculous; adults smile because they’ve all issued the same warning. Blanche Fisher Wright’s picture completes the joke — Timothy out in the snow, caught mid-scowl, while a fashionable lady skates by, clearly unsure what to make of him.
It’s the kind of nonsense morality tale only early twentieth-century nursery rhymes could deliver — equal parts caution, comedy, and charm.
