Meltdown as temper tantrum

[Mark Peters]

  Actually, the OED's first use involves ice cream!

 1937 Ice Cream Trade Jrnl. Mar. 36/1 The Sod. Alg. ice cream melts down cleanly in the mouth... Due to the clean melt-down..a cooler sensation results in the mouth than with gelatin ice cream.

 But all the other early uses go in the catastrophic category...

 Mark
  Scot LaFaive <slafaive at GMAIL.COM> wrote: ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender:       American Dialect Society
Poster:       Scot LaFaive
Subject:      Re: Meltdown as temper tantrum
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I don't have the info you want; I just have more questions. Is
"meltdown" specifically derived from the catastrophic nuclear reactor
event or does it somehow predate that?

Scot


On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 2:18 PM, Mark Peters  wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society
> Poster:       Mark Peters
> Subject:      Meltdown as temper tantrum
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>  I'm working on a new column about the language of children's tantrums, fits, and snits. I think I'm going to focus on the wide use of meltdown. I haven't run into a single parent of young children who doesn't use this term. The OED has meltdown being used figuratively since 1983, but there's nothing specifically about it as a child-centric term.
>
>  Does anybody have a lead or theory on meltdown's history re: kids? If you know of any other synonyms, that would be a help too...
>
>  Mark
>
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