[Ads-l] "the greatest thing to happen to TV since sliced bread"

[Baker, John]

Sliced bread, when first introduced, was advertised as "the greatest forward step in the baking industry since bread was wrapped."

But perhaps the question is more general:  In 1928, when sliced bread was introduced, did people say “it’s the greatest thing since X,” and if so, what was X?  People did say “it’s the greatest thing since X,” but X did not have a standard value.  X tended to be something historical, such as Columbus, Moses, or the Flood.


John Baker


From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Dan Goncharoff
Sent: Monday, May 21, 2018 10:25 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: "the greatest thing to happen to TV since sliced bread"

It's fire, then the wheel, then sliced bread.

On Mon, May 21, 2018, 9:12 PM Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:

> I’ve always wondered what sliced bread was the greatest thing since.
>
>
> > On May 21, 2018, at 8:07 PM, George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
> wrote:
> >
> > Specifically, "the remote control is the greatest thing to happen to TV
> > since sliced bread".
> > From a commercial for something or other, heard, in part, this evening.
> > I had forgotten that sliced bread had once happened to TV. I looked it
> up,
> > and it was in 1953, but my family didn't get a TV until 1954.
> > Those of you learned in the study of language will no doubt have a word
> for
> > this sort of utterance. I call it muddled speech (alluding to an
> > unavoidable TV commercial of 1954). *
> >
> > ​GAT​
> >
> > * Doctors call it "Iron Deficiency Anemia". We call it "tired blood".
> >
> > --
> > George A. Thompson
> > The Guy Who Still Looks Stuff Up in Books.
> > Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
> > Univ. Pr., 1998.
> >
> > But when aroused at the Trump of Doom / Ye shall start, bold kings, from
> > your lowly tomb. . .
> > L. H. Sigourney, "Burial of Mazeen", Poems. Boston, 1827, p. 112
> >
> > The Trump of Doom -- also known as The Dunghill Toadstool. (Here's a
> > picture of his great-grandfather.)
> >
> http://www.parliament.uk/worksofart/artwork/james-gillray/an-excrescence---a-fungus-alias-a-toadstool-upon-a-dunghill/3851<http://www.parliament.uk/worksofart/artwork/james-gillray/an-excrescence---a-fungus-alias-a-toadstool-upon-a-dunghill/3851>
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org<http://www.americandialect.org>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org<http://www.americandialect.org>
>

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