[Ads-l] "go ape(shit)"

[Ben Zimmer]

Thanks, Garson! Not sure how I missed that one...


On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 6:27 PM, ADSGarson O'Toole <
adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:

> Nice work, Ben. Here is an instance of "gone ape" in December 1950.
>
> Date: Sunday, December 10, 1950
> Publication: The Akron Beacon Journal
> Location: Akron, Ohio
> Article: Gambling Great Stuff As GIs Pile Up Cash: Sidelights On the
> War Include Fine Array Of Soldier Lingo
> Author: Fred Sparks (Chicago Daily News Foreign Service)
> Quote Page 11C, Column 6
> Database: Newspapers.com
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> GI Dictionary, Korean Campaign. "He's gone ape" means: He's blown his top.
> [End excerpt]
>
> Garson
>
>
> On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 6:02 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I've got a piece up on Slate on the history of "go ape(shit)."
> >
> > https://slate.com/culture/2018/06/apeshit-etymology-the-
> history-of-the-phrase-behind-beyonce-and-jay-zs-new-single.html
> >
> > Antedatings for "go ape" (OED/HDAS 1955, GDoS 1954):
> >
> > Desert Hot Springs (Calif.) Sentinel, Oct. 11, 1951, p. 6, col. 3
> > I hear that the new by-word is "I'm going gorilla" instead of "I'm going
> > ape."
> > https://www.newspapers.com/clip/21068697/go_ape/
> >
> > Albuquerque (N.M.) Journal, Dec. 6, 1951, p. 13, col. 2
> > "he went ape" -- to extremes.
> > https://www.newspapers.com/clip/21069343/go_ape/
> >
> > I wasn't able to antedate the earliest HDAS cite for "go apeshit" from
> Walt
> > Sheldon's 1952 novel "Troubling of a Star" ("What do I want to fight for?
> > You going apeshit?"). (JL dated the cite to 1951, presumably as an
> > approximate date of the novel's writing.)
> >
> >
>

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