"potatohead"

[Joel S. Berson]

I did not find "potato head" (with or without the space) in Early
American Newspapers or 19th Century U.S. Newspapers.

Joel

At 4/18/2011 10:32 AM, you wrote:
>At 4/18/2011 09:07 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>>"These potatoheads": Irish people; "micks." [in HDAS files; 500,000+ Google
>>hits on "Irish potatohead"]
>
>I'm surprised to see that the OED (March 2011) only dates the Irish
>connection back to 1948!  It's under sense 1.b, whereas 1.a., dating
>to 1705, says:
>
>"a. A person's head likened to a potato, either in appearance, as
>being large, bald, ugly, etc., or as implying stupidity.
>      Sometimes associated with Irishness; cf. sense 1b."
>
>I'll have a look in American newspapers.
>
>Joel

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