"My very educated mother just served us nine pickles" (1966)

Bapopik at AOL.COM Bapopik at AOL.COM
Wed Aug 30 23:16:55 UTC 2006


14 March 1934, Winnipeg Free Press, pg. 8:
Do you find it hard to remember the order of the planets in their distance
from the sun?
...
If so, you may find it helpful to use a "memory sentence." Here is such a
sentence: "Men Very Early Made Jars Serve Up New Potatoes."
...
The initial letter in each word in that sentence is the first letter in the
name of a planet. Thus we may write it this way: "Men (Mercury), Very (Venus),
 Early (Earth), Made (Mars), Jars (Jupiter), Serve (Saturn), Up (Uranus), New
 (Neptune), Potatoes (Pluto)."
...
If you get the sentence clearly in mind, I think you will have little
trouble in remembering the order of the planets, Mercury being closest to the  sun
and Pluto farthest away. There are two "M's" but Men starts with "MR," the
same as Mercury; and Made with "MA," the same as Mars.
...
A similar memory sentence, told to me by a friendly reader, was used in the
old days before the planet Pluto was known. The sentence was, "Mary's Violet
Eyes Made John Stay Up Nights. ["Plenty" was later added--ed.]
...
...
...
16 September 1966, Austin (MN) Daily Herald, pg. 4?
A SIXTH grade teacher in another city has an idea that some pupils and
teachers may want to use. The major planets according to their distance from the
sun are: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and
Pluto. So to make it easy to remember this, all you have to do is remember the
simple phrase: "My very educated mother just served us nine  pickles."

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



More information about the Ads-l mailing list