"Black Friday," again

[Bonnie Taylor-Blake]

We've previously discussed when "Black Friday" may have first become
attached to the day after Thanksgiving Day (and what significance the term
held to those who did the attaching), so I won't go over old ground [1].

I was a little surprised to see, then, that the Wikipedia page on this term
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_%28shopping%29) includes the
following mention of a 1922 usage.  (Incidentally, this snippet appears in
the "Accounting Practice" portion of the page.)

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Earliest citation, speaking to the Friday after Thanksgiving:

A BLACK FRIDAY.
There have been many Black Fridays in recent history. Most of them have been
days of financial panic. There has been none of blacker foreboding than last
Friday. And the blackness is not loss or fear of loss in stocks and bonds.
New York Times (1857-Current file).
New York, N.Y.: Dec 3, 1922. pg. 38, 1 pgs

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In fact, that *New York Times* article has nothing really to do with "the
Friday after Thanksgiving," but instead describes diplomatic reaction (or
lack thereof) on Friday, 1 December 1922 to the formal announcement in
Lausanne of a decree calling for the expulsion of Greeks from Turkey.  (The
first two paragraphs of the piece follow.)

In the end, there's no mention of Thanksgiving Day.  The closest we come to
that holiday is that 1 December was technically the day after Thanksgiving
here in the States.

-- Bonnie

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A BLACK FRIDAY.

There have been many Black Fridays in recent history.  Most of them have
been days of financial panic.  There has been none of blacker foreboding
than last Friday.  And the blackness is not loss or fear of loss in stocks
and bonds.  It is the blackness of loss of home, the blackness of exile and
suffering and the peril of death.  But that which deepens the darkness that
has come upon the earth in the broad daylight of the twentieth century is
civilization's prompt acceptance of the Turks' decree of banishment not only
of a million Greeks, but incidentally of all Christian minorities within the
Turkish realm beyond the Hellespont, which the Aryan crossed over three
thousand years ago.  Light blackens such a blot.  Lord CURZON but urged that
the Greeks be gotten out as quickly as possible in order to escape massacre.
For the rest there was, so far as reported, only quiet acquiescence.

Meanwhile, the dispatches from Washington of the same date report that the
Administration believes that the United States "is not without influence at
Lausanne," that not only the Allies but the Turkish representatives appear
to be "wholly satisfied" with the part that the United States is playing at
Lausanne, and that the very latest reports from Ambassador CHILD enable the
Department of State to draw the conclusion that the work of the "gathering"
at Lausanne is "proceeding satisfactorily."  Let us assume that the "very
latest reports" do not include the happenings of Friday.  If the Government
were knowingly "wholly satisfied" with that day's record, then black were
white.  It is inconceivable that the American people can be "wholly
satisfied" with our part as the Turks are reported to be.

[Etc.]

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[1] Earliest printed sightings of "Black Friday" in the sense of what a
traffic and shopping nightmare the day holds seem to date to the mid-1970s;
the earliest sighting I've now come across for the sense of "putting
businesses' ledgers back into black" is a 26 November 1982 broadcast of ABC
News's "World News Tonight."

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