"Mistake on the Lake" (continued)

Bapopik at AOL.COM Bapopik at AOL.COM
Tue Oct 19 00:27:59 UTC 1999


"MISTAKE ON THE LAKE" (continued)

   This is from a long article about then-Cleveland mayor Dennis Kucinich, in the CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, 9 April 1978, pg. 64, col. 2:

    The ceiling is stratospheric, the floor is covered with Oriental rugs and the walls are hung with expensive tapestries, one of them depicting Gen. Moses Cleaveland (the city later would misspell his name) as he undertakes a 1796 survey of Cleveland, "the mistake on the lake" in the jargon of CBers, 1978.

   CB radio jargon!
   The Paul Dickson BASEBALL DICTIONARY entry leads people to believe the term goes back to the Cleveland Indians of the 1950s.
   I checked out several CB radio books (I didn't have time for magazines--it's 90 minutes' delivery time) at the Library of Congress.  Most of the books are from 1976.  CB city slang is used, but Cleveland is called "Dirty City" or "Iron Town" (CB SLANG DICTIONARY HANDBOOK, 1976).
   For further information, someone should ask Kucinich.  He's very much alive and still in politics.

--------------------------------------------------------
CRAB

   This is from the WASHINGTON CITY PAPER, 15 October 1999, pg. 54, col. 5:

   "Those are crabs, right?" I asked Madness as Swift launched into some deft, warp-speed scratching.
   Madness nodded.  I felt rather proud of myself.  A "crab" is a particularly fluid way of working the cross-fader on a mixer with all five fingers.  The result kind of looks like a crab walking.  It was a term that I'd picked up from hanging around these turntable types.  You can learn a lot from DJs.

(Not in RHHDAS--ed.)



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