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THE PHRASE
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WHERE DID THE PHRASE "HOW MANY BEANS MAKE 5?" ORIGINATE? WHY?
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For more on marking an answer as the "Best Answer", please visit our FAQ.According to Nigel Rees in Phrases and Sayings, Miss Alice Lloyd was singing a music-hall song in November 1898 which contained these lines:
'You say you've never heard
How many beans make five?
It's time you knew a thing or two
You don't know you're alive! '
The phrase was also recorded 12 years earlier and seems to come from the heyday of Victorian humour.
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