American Language Supplement 2 (160 page)

2
The literature of cattlemen’s speech before 1939 is listed in Burke, pp. 99–100 and 145–46. Later studies worth consulting are Bronc Peelers, by John L. Sinclair,
New Mexico
, Feb., 1939, pp. 18–20; the glossary in Wyoming: a Guide to Its History, Highways and People; New York, 1941, pp. 459–66; Nebraska Cowboy Talk, by Rudolph Umland,
American Speech
, Feb., 1942, pp. 73–75; Stock Jargon, in Nevada: a Guide to the Silver State; Portland (Ore.), n. d., pp. 75–78; Southwestern Speech, by Haldeen Braddy,
American Speech
, Dec., 1945, p. 306; Lingo of the Cowpoke, in the programme of the National Western Stock Show; Denver, Jan. 13–21, 1945, p. 42, and Waddies’ Lingo, by James F. Bender, New York
Times Magazine
, Oct. 20, 1946, p. 35. I am indebted for friendly aid to Messrs. Don Bloch, J. N. Beffel, L. J. Carrel, Don McCarthy, Fred Hamann, Frank Foster and Thomas Caldecott Chubb.

3
The itinerant chautauqua is now extinct, though the Mother Church, established in 1874 at Chautauqua, N. Y., still exists. Many of the old-time chautauquans have become radio-crooners or public jobholders. I present a few specimens of their argot as relics of a past day, like those of the telegraphers. The itinerant chautauqua flourished from 1904 to 1932. See notes on it by J. R. Schultz in
American Notes & Queries
, Feb., 1942, p. 167, and Dec., 1943, p. 142.

4
Said by J. R. Schultz, in Chautauqua Talk,
American Speech
, Aug., 1932, p. 408, to have been named after its inventor,
Dr. Ott
, a lecturer.

5
This comes from the paper by J. R. Schultz, before cited, and from another by the same,
American Speech
, Oct., 1934, pp. 232–34. Schultz says that a performer working one was said to be
on the sevens
. This recalls
on the—circus
and
on the heavy
.

1
These come mainly from The Language of the Buckeye, by Norman E. Eliason,
American Speech
, Dec., 1937, pp. 270–74.

2
A Reporter at Large,
New Yorker
, Feb. 15, 1947, p. 59.

3
A cigarmaker is said to
break
a bunch, not to
make
it.

4
Traced by the DAE to 1893, but much older. Named after the
Conestoga
-wagon. See Supplement I, p. 233, and The
Stogie
Comes Into Its Own, by Richard McCardell,
Facts
, Aug., 1945, p. 83.

5
A discussion of the names, mostly Spanish, of cigar shapes and colors would take us too far afield. The former are described, with illustrations, in Tobaccoland, by Carl Avery Werner; New York, 1922, pp. 386–96. Colors run from
claro
, the lightest, through
colorado claro, colorado, colorado maduro
(the typical tobacco color) and
maduro
to
oscuro
, the darkest. The machine is driving out the old-time cigarmakers. They have a rich folklore, and believe that every member of the craft, at death, is transmogrified into a jackass. Whenever a jackass passed a cigar-shop,
c
. 1890, the men stopped work and gave him three cheers, always professing to recognize some departed comrade.

6
So far as I know, there is no report in print upon the argot used by clergymen in their professional bull-sessions. The Catholic Language, by Benjamin Musser,
Ecclesiastical Review
, Dec., 1926, pp. 573–83, is an amusing account of the errors made by non-Catholics (and by many Catholics) in using the technical terms of Holy Church. I have borrowed a few terms from it for the brief list below. For the speech of Quakers see the papers listed in AL4, p. 450, n. 1, and p. 589, n. 1. For that of Mormons see the latter note. I have also added a few terms not confined to the clergy, nor even to the saved.

1
Sunday-school
was coined by Robert Raikes (1735–1811), publisher of the Gloucester (England)
Journal
, who opened the first Sunday-school at Gloucester in 1780.

2
The Episcopacy of Zion Methodist Will be Celebration Highlight, Pittsburgh
Courier
, July 27, 1946: “Bishops Lynwood Westinghouse Kyles, George Clinton Clement were among the outstanding
episcopates
of modern days.”

3
Apparently obsolete. See
Converted Catholic Magazine
, Oct., 1943, p. 204.

4
Novitiate
in this sense is denounced by Father Musser, before cited, as an error made by “nine out of ten non-Catholics,” but the NED shows that it has been in good usage in England since 1655.

5
AL4, p. 179, n. 3.

6
Billy Sunday: Tabernacles and Sawdust Trails, by T. T. Frankenberg; Columbus (O.), 1917, p. 81: “The phrase originated during Mr. Sunday’s first campaign on Puget Sound. The use of sawdust and shavings made a particular appeal to the lumbermen who predominated in that region.” See also
American Notes & Queries
, Feb., 1946, p. 168.

7
He is supposed to have an extraordinary facility for getting ecclesiastical preferment.

8
These come from Cocker Cant, Baltimore
Evening Sun
, April 24, 1939, Sect. II, p. 17; English Cock-fighting,
Living Age
, June, 1937, pp. 350–52; Rooster Fight, by Wayne Gard,
Southwest Review
, Autumn, 1936, pp. 65–70, and High-Flyers, by Peter Tamony, San Francisco
News-Letter & Wasp
, July 28, 1939, p. 9.

1
Cock-fighting has given the general speech many phrases,
e.g., dead game, to stand the gaff, pitted against
and
to crow over
.

2
Some of these come from Life in a Putty-Knife Factory, by H. Allen Smith; Garden City (N.Y.), 1943, p. 158.

3
This list is based upon one by F. O. Richey, published in the
William Feather Magazine
, Sept., 1943. The variants are from Johns Hopkins Jargon, by J. Louis Kuethe,
American Speech
, June, 1932, p. 331; a note by William Feather in the
William Feather Magazine
, Feb., 1944, and Cries of Crap Shooters, by Clinton Sanders,
American Notes & Queries
, June, 1942, pp. 42–43.

4
Kuethe and Feather:
eighter from Decatur
.

5
Kuethe, Feather and Sanders add
from Boston
, and Sanders offers an etymology.

6
Kuethe omits the
big
.

7
This is from Kuethe. Feather gives
Nina from Carolina
, or
from Argentina
. Richey says that “a nine seems to have no name.”

8
Kuethe:
cat-eyes
.

1
Kuethe:
Captain Jimmy Hicks of the Horse Marines
.

2
Kuethe adds
from Kokomo
. A writer in
American Notes & Queries
, June, 1941, p. 43, suggests that this may be rhyming slang from
little fo’
(four). This is disputed by D. W. Maurer in the same, Jan., 1945, p. 160. A writer in
American Notes & Queries
, Oct., 1943, p. 112, says that
Little Joe picked the cotton
is “a commonly accepted form.”

3
Kuethe makes it
Phoebe the preacher’s daughter
.

4
In
Viggerish
, New York
Times Magazine
, Oct. 31, 1943, p. 2, David Shilman suggests that it is an English loan from
vicarage
, suggested by the collection of tithes.

5
From Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

6
These come mainly from Department Store Technical Expressions, by Alice Smart,
American Speech
, Dec., 1938, pp. 312–13 and Consumer Vocabulary, by Mamie Meredith, the same, Feb., 1939, p. 80.

7
Ger.
dreck
, dirt.

8
i.e.
, just looking.

9
Mooch
is old English slang for one who idles and hangs about. Partridge says that it may have some relation to the French
mucher
, to hide, or skulk.

10
Miss Smart says that they are circled in red on the order-list.

11
Ger.
schlag
, a blow or shock. Like many other terms in the vocabularies of the Jewish trades, it probably came in through Yiddish.

1
These terms come from Stillers’ Argot, by Fred Hamann,
American Speech
, Oct., 1946, pp. 193–95; Scotch Whiskey,
Forum
, June, 1946, pp. 135–36 and 180–92, and Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

2
I take all these from A Dictionary of Dogdom Terms, by Bob Becker, Chicago
Tribune
, Oct. 13, 1939.

3
The argot of farmers differs so much in different parts of the country that all I can do is to offer a few random specimens, chiefly from the Middle West. They come mainly from Middlewestern Farm English, by Russell T. Prescott,
American Speech
, April, 1937, pp. 102–07; Cornhusking and Other Terms, by Mamie Meredith, the same, Feb., 1938, pp. 19–24, and Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

1
“In the dictionary,” says Prescott, “one can find such terms as
piggery
and
pigsty
, which are rarely, if ever, used on American farms, but he will not find
hog-lot
or
hog-house
, which deserve recognition … as the terms commonly used.” This was published in 1937. Since then the DAE (1940) has listed both terms. It traces
hog-lot
to 1835 and
hog-house
to 1638.

2
The word is an Americanism, and is traced by the DAE to 1887.

3
For the argot of workers in the sugar-beet fields of the West see Sugar-Beet Language, by Levette J. Davidson,
American Speech
, Oct., 1930, pp. 10–15; for that of the hopfields, Hopfield Terms From Western New York, by J. R. Shulters,
Dialect Notes
, Vol. V, Part V, 1922, pp. 182–83, and for that of English farmers, Pure English of the Soil, by William A. Craigie,
S.P.E. Tract No. LXIV
, 1945, pp. 79–107.

4
Said to be from
buffalo
, and to have been suggested by the fact that the wealthy young men who belonged to the early volunteer fire-companies commonly wore buffalo-skin coats in Winter. See Running Down the Name
Fire Buff
, New York
Sun
, Nov. 16, 1937, p. 28. Other authorities say that it originated in the fact that many of the early firemen wore
buff
uniforms.

1
That Word
Potsy
, by A. W. M., New York
Sun
, March 26, 1932: “From the piece of tin can, doubled and redoubled and stamped flat, which is kicked about by the juvenile player of the game
potsy
.”

2
They are wide-bottomed and their ends are left outside rubber boots. The fireman sleeps with a shirt on, and when the man on watch yells “Get out!” the sleeper swings his feet out from under the blankets and steps into the
turnouts
.

3
I am indebted here to Firemen Invent Their Own Slang, New York
Sun
, March 16, 1932; Fire Department Slanguage, by S. James Lynch,
Writers’ Digest
, Sept., 1941, pp. 23–24; Smoke Eaters Lingo,
New Yorker
, March 31, 1945, p. 41; A Preliminary Glossary of the New York City Firemen, by Leo Blond and Harold J. Jonas,
American Notes & Queries
, April, 1944, pp. 3–8; Where’s the Fire?,
Better English
, July-Aug., 1939, p. 39, and Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

4
These come from Schoonerisms, by David W. Maurer,
American Speech
, June, 1930, pp. 387–95, and Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

1
For the argot of crabbers see Crab Talk, by Mamie Meredith,
American Speech
, Aug., 1931, p. 465; for that of sealers, Sealing Nomenclature, by C. G. Porcher, the same, April, 1934, pp. 156–57, and Newfoundland Dialect Items, by George Allan England,
Dialect Notes
, Vol. V, Part VIII, 1925, pp. 322–46, and for that of sports fishermen, Tackle Terminology, by a committee of the National Association of Angling and Casting Clubs; St. Louis, 1945.

2
The queer lingo used in transmitting orders from table to kitchen was noted by a writer in the Detroit
Free Press
so long ago as Jan. 7, 1852,
e.g., fried bedpost, mashed tambourine
and
roasted stirrups
. In 1876 J. G. Holland, then editor of
Scribner’s
, discussed it in his Everyday Topics, p. 386. It was richly developed by the colored waiters who flourished in the 1870s and 80s but is now pretty well confined to the waitresses and countermen who glorify third-rate eating-houses. The following specimens come from Hash House Lingo, by Jack Smiley; Easton (Pa.), 1941; The Private Language of Eating Joints, Chicago
Tribune
, Nov. 12, 1940, p. 16; A Glossary of Café Terms, by Oran B. Bailey,
American Speech
, Dec., 1943, pp. 307–08; Curb Service, by Theodore Pratt,
New Yorker
, Jan. 8, 1938, pp. 48–49, and the Language of West Coast Culinary Workers, by Robert Shafer,
American Speech
, April, 1946, pp. 86–89. I am also indebted to Mr. Paul McPharlin.

3
“A waitress,” says Shafer, before cited, “thinks any man drinking buttermilk ought to be in Arizona for his health.”

1
Variety
, Sept. 27, 1937, p. 63: “
Curb-hopping
is strictly an American enterprise. It originated during the 1925 Miami land boom, but since then has gained protagonists in practically every city of the United States.”

2
Supplement I, p. 604.

3
See also Hotel-workers and Soda jerkers.

4
From Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

1
From Lexicon of Trade Jargon. All come from New York City.

2
From Lexicon of Trade Jargon.

3
Yiddish
mechulle
, spoiled, out of order, bankrupt.
Ba’al
is a generic designation for one performing a function,
e.g., ba’al brith
, the father of a boy at a circumcision;
ba’al keria
, one who reads the Torah in a synagogue.