card sharp (1874), card shark (1884)

[Wilson Gray]

In my childhood, at the tail-end of the great era of the horse opera,
I could never be sure whether I was hearing "card sharp" or "card
shark." It's a relief to know that I really was hearing both.

-Wilson Gray


On 9/6/05, Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at rci.rutgers.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at RCI.RUTGERS.EDU>
> Subject:      card sharp (1874), card shark (1884)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> If I read the archives correctly, "card sharp" has been dated to 1888 and
> "card shark" to 1891 (both cites found by Douglas Wilson in Feb. 2003).
> Newspaperarchive turns up these antedatings:
>
>
> 1874 _Oakland Evening Tribune_ 28 Aug. 2/2 Almost daily, passengers on the
> overland route are robbed by "card sharps."
>
> 1884 _Perry Pilot_ (Iowa) 2 Apr. 8/3 Perhaps it is that the most
> picturesque and attractive men to be found in New York streets, are bunko
> men, card sharks, adventurers and dissipated club men, who live without
> visible means of
> support.
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>


--
-Wilson Gray