Etymology of "wacko"

[Baker, John]

        Should the -o ending be considered so limited?  Think of the
Marx Brothers, with Harpo so-called because he played a harp, Chico
liked the chicks (it was originally Chicko, but the k was quickly
dropped), and so forth.  There's an account of their naming in Harpo's
autobiography, Harpo Speaks; I don't have it available, but they
certainly took on these names well before 1935.

John Baker


-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf
Of Joel S. Berson
Sent: Monday, January 30, 2006 10:50 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Etymology of "wacko"

OED2:  wack (n):  An eccentric or crazy person; a madman, a crackpot.
    1938 'E. Queen' Four of Hearts (1939) i. 9 All you wacks act this
way at first. Them that can take it snaps out of it.

OED2 dates "wacky (a)"from 1935.

But -- the -o seems to be derived not only from adjectives with negative
connotations, but also from (the first syllable of) nouns, as in
"klepto", from "kleptomaniac"?

Joel

At 1/30/2006 09:28 AM, RonButters wrote:
Thanks for the explanation. I somehow missed the step that e.g.
STINKO is immediately derived from STINKY, not STINK. Still, in that
case, how is WACKY derived from WACK? What is a "wack"? Didn't that have
something to do with women in the army during WWII?

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