"like pickles and ice cream" (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Jonathan Lighter]

So we can take it back another decade or so. Nice!

JL

On Mon, Mar 28, 2011 at 1:26 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC <
Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
> Subject:      Re: "like pickles and ice cream" (UNCLASSIFIED)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> Caveats: NONE
>
>
> >  A 1968 ex. refers to the craving during pregnancy as "time-honored,"
> but GB
> > reveals *nothing* relevant before 1967 in a search for "pickles and
> ice
> > cream" + "expecting" [or "expectant"/"pregnant"/"pregnancy"].  It does
> find
> > an unmistakable ex. of the less euphonious "ice cream and pickles"
> from
> > Doris Lessing in "1952" (though WorldCat suggests "1954").
> >
> > What we know: "pickles and ice cream" seems to have entered pop
> culture as a
> > sign of pregnancy no earlier than the 1950s.
>
> Earliest useful cite I see is 1944.  Most prior collocations of pickles
> and ice cream are:
> 1.  a comparison to some pair which is self-evidently incompatible
> (usually in articles about sports, it seems);
> 2.  a reference to a meal which would cause stomach aches or bad dreams
> (a la Welsh Rarebit); and
> 3.  straightforward lists of dishes served (at picnics, school lunches,
> etc.) with no indication that there is anything wrong with serving the
> two foods together.
>
> I'd think one of the reasons that cites before the late 1950s are so
> rare is the taboo of discussing pregnancy; not that it wasn't understood
> that pregnant women didn't have cravings for odd foods.
>
>
> _Augusta [GA] Chronicle_ 5/7/1944 p 15 col 4 [quoting Gracie Allen;
> GeneaologyBank]
> "During a political year, a man resembles in many ways nothing so much
> as a woman who is going to have a baby.  He is nervous, irritable, bites
> his nails, and can often be found eating strange combinations like
> pickles and ice cream."
>
>
> _Cedar Rapids [IA] Gazette_ 5/25/1950 p 14 col 3 [UP article;
> Newspaperarchive]
> "Dill pickles and ice cream at midnight? Watermelon and soda crackers at
> 4 a.m.?  Expectant mothers used to order these strange combinations in
> the middle of the night."
>
> Ed McBain _The 87th Precinct_ NY:  Simon and Schuster, 1959. p 180
> [Google Books]
> "Look, Bert, when a woman is carrying, she gets goofy ideas.  Pickles
> and ice cream, you know?"
>
> Lloyd Alexander _Janine is French_  NY: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1959. [Google
> Books]
> "I would have been undisturbed had Janine followed the traditional
> pattern of waking in the middle of the night with an intense yearning
> for pickles and ice cream."
>
>
> Zanesville, OH _Times Recorder_ 12/13/1963 p 15 col 2 [syndicated Earl
> Wilson column; Newspaperarchive]
> "Jack Carter and his beautiful wife Paul Stewart - who were at that Jule
> Styne party - said:  "If my wife gets sharp hunger pains about 5 o'clock
> in the morning, and sends me out for pickles and ice cream, it doesn't
> mean what it usually does under such circumstances.
> "It just means there's a restaurant strike and she didn't get any
> dinner." "
>
>
> Uniontown PA _Evening Standard_ 3/20/1964 p 19 col 4
> [In an advice column, bylined by Dorothy Dix, but signed by Dr. Joyce
> Brothers, about how men react to pregnancies. Newspaperarchive]
> "Poised uncomfortably on the edge of a chair, he'll be ready to leap to
> his feet, and run to fetch anything from a glass of water to pickles and
> ice cream."
>
>
> Pasadena CA _Star-News_ 5/17/1966 p 25 col 6 [AP article,
> Newspaperarchive]
> "Tuesday Weld and husband Claude Harz have been borrowing movies from
> the Walt Disney Library to run off at their home in Malibu Beach.
> Watching "Pinocchio" and the like, explains Tuesday, results in
> "vibrations" which are good for an expectant mother. Anyway, it must be
> better than pickles and ice cream."
>
>
> _Lewiston [ME] Evening Journal_ 2/3/1967 p 16 col 5 [AP article, Google
> News Archive]
> "Most expectant mothers eat things like pickles and ice cream, but
> there's one mother-to-be in Boston that prefers to eat tree bark and hum
> a lot."
>
> Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> Caveats: NONE
>
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