Apparently, Goldilocks was not originally a little girl, but once an old woman in Joseph Jacob and other’s early versions of the tale. Like many fairy tales, the story was changed over time (not just when orally passed down, but after being published), so that the main character became the young blonde. In this version, it is Goldilocks and not an old woman who ransacks the bears’ home. Like most fairy tales, it is great to see the differences between this version of the story and the “cleaner” version we usually hear. 

“Goldilocks had heard in her sleep the great, rough, gruff voice of the Great, Huge Bear; but she was so fast asleep that it was no more to her than the roaring of wind or the rumbling of thunder. And she had heard the middle voice of the Middle Bear, but it was only as if she had heard someone speaking in a dream. But when she heard the little, small, wee voice of the Little, Small, Wee Bear, it was so sharp, and so shrill, that it awakened her at once.”

“Out the little old Woman (soon to become Goldilocks) jumped; and whether she broke her neck in the fall; or ran into the wood and was lost there; or found her way out of the wood, and was taken up by the constable and sent to the House of Correction for a vagrant as she was, I cannot tell. But the Three Bears never saw anything more of her.”

Sudden realization: Goldilocks was the original “Bed Intruder!”

“Climbing in you window, she’s snatchin’ your porridge up…”