salugi

[Jonathan Lighter]

The Files contain a printed example of "salugi" from a 1956 bestseller
about Brooklyn. It refers to the 1940s.

1956 Gerald Green _The Last Angry Man_  207 [rpt. N.Y.: Pocket Books,
1972]: They had seized the tan derby of one of their number...[and] were
tossing it around in a wild game of _salugi_.

Green was born in 1922.

JL


On Fri, May 2, 2014 at 5:04 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: salugi
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Mr. Samuel Solomon of Forest Hills wrote to Hy Gardner's column in the
> Philadelphia Inquirer (Dec. 27, 1961), p. 13 to reminisce about "the good
> old days":
>
> "When New York City policemen wore a high, round grey helmet...When streets
> had lampposts lit by a man with a long stick...When we played the
> frustrating game of salugi, or however you spelled it. A toughie from
> another neighborhood would steal your ball, then taunt you by throwing it
> to everyone but you."
>
> (A tip o' the Saluggi hat to  http://www.fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html  !)
>
> My grandparents used to reminisce about the same things - except for the
> saluggi part, though my recollection is that my grandfather (b. 1884) was
> thoroughly familiar with the concept if not the word.
>
> The word "toughie" alone and the past tense of "spell" are almost enough to
> persuade me that Sam was relating a genuine memory of the ancient world.
>
> I believe that the virtual absence of this word in print is due to the
> difficulty of spelling it convincingly.
>
> A more chilling possibility is that in any era, the spoken vocabulary has
> little to do with its printed cousin.  So give up on historical
> dictionaries.
>
> (The Old Fulton search function turned up a circa 1905 "Anti-Salooji
> League," but it was only a bad scan.)
>
> JL
>
>
>
>
> On Fri, May 2, 2014 at 3:47 PM, David Barnhart <dbarnhart at highlands.com
> >wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       David Barnhart <dbarnhart at HIGHLANDS.COM>
> > Subject:      salugi
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > With his pugnacious, street-tough manner, Buchanan looks as if he spent
> his
> > youth standing outside yeshivas and tormenting the Hebrew students by
> > playing salugi with their yarmulkes. Lars-Erik Nelson, "Dole's Feeling A
> > Pat
> > On Back Republicans Fear A Loose Bucannon," Daily News [New York]
> (Nexis),
> > Feb. 13, 1996, p 2
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org