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The old rhyme offers one explanation why countless homeowners across the Lowcountry trim their doors and windows in blue, or perhaps more commonly seen today, their porch ceilings.
Many say the hue was once believed to keep ghosts, or haints, out of a home. Hence the name, "haint blue."
Others say the color is peaceful and reminds them of water.
"It used to be on St. Helena Island that almost every house had the window and door trim painted blue," Webb said. "I've heard all kinds of reasons why."
One common theory traces the tradition to African Gullah-Geechee culture, a mix of tribes who were sold into slavery in the 17th and 18th centuries and transported to the American South.
Author Roger Pinckney wrote in "Blue Roots: African-American Folk Magic of the Gullah People," that many Lowcountry plantations raising indigo would produce dye from the plants and then offer their slaves dregs from the boiling pots, which they "used to decorate window frames and port posts, in the belief the blue color kept the plentiful spirits at bay."
"It is a practice that survives to this day, perhaps no longer for a spiritual repellent but as a tradition," Pinckney wrote.
Queen Quet, chieftess of the Gullah-Geechee Nation, which is headquartered on St. Helena Island, said the indigo color is not so much used to ward off evil spirits as it is considered a general color of protection.
The Gullah-Geechee consider blue a "spiritual signature," said Michael Allen, a community partnership specialist with the National Parks Service representing the Gullah-Geechee Culture Corridor, which runs from Wilmington, N.C. to Jacksonville, Fla.
While the tradition started with doors and windows, it evolved to include porch ceilings and caught on throughout the area, Allen said.
For some, the color simply invokes a sense of calm.
Louise Miller Cohen, a Hilton Head Island native with Gullah roots, said she was never taught the tradition but she still loves the color.
"To me, (blue) brings a calmness, a restful and a peaceful mood," Cohen said. "My mama never mentioned that it was to ward off the evil spirits ... If that was true, it was very well hidden from me."
For Webb, a general contractor who often works with historic restoration, he prefers the "haint blue" hue more for its beauty and practicality than for the tradition, he said.
"More than anything, it's a color that I like and it goes with pretty much whatever you do," Webb said. "Spiders don't like it. I don't know why, they don't seem to make cobwebs on it as badly as they do on other colors."
