Songfacts®:

• Sometimes titled "He's in the Jailhouse Now," this lighthearted song about a small-time criminal who gets locked up became a popular vaudeville number in the early 20th century. One of the earliest and most popular recordings was by Jimmie Rodgers, a country musician known for his signature yodeling, in 1928.
  
  Rodgers is one of several musicians who copyrighted a version of the song, and he is often credited as the writer. A case can also be made for the blues musician Pink Anderson (the "Pink" in Pink Floyd), who performed the song at medicine shows around the American south.
• Webb Pierce recorded a popular version of this song that was a #1 Country hit in 1955. Johnny Cash - no stranger to prison songs - included the song on his 1962 album The Sound of Johnny Cash and released it as a single that year, taking it to #8 on the Country chart.
• Actor Tim Blake Nelson, who played Delmar O'Donnell in O Brother, Where Art Thou?, performed this song with the Soggy Bottom Boys for the movie and its soundtrack.