moolah and money

[Mike Cleven]

At 10:12 PM 6/23/99 -0700, Andy Nousen wrote:
>Klahowya kwonesum Chinook wawa tillicums,
>
>"Moolah" means mill, correct? I've grown up hearing it used as meaning
>money. Is this coincidence, or related to earning money by working at a
>mill?

That's what I think, although as with "stick" and other such
possible-Jargon/NW origin words, some kind of historical provenance would
have to be provided to show that the usage originated here.  As a possible
French loan-word in English, it has to be considered that "moolah" may even
have been coined in the Industrial Age in England (where French was
certainly not unknown).  Wherever, no doubt some wag in an after-work bar
made a pun, and it stuck and became current, its original meaning forgotten.

There _is_ a definite sociocultural connection between the two meanings,
wherever its origin - and it's common today to hear a worker in a BC
resource town refer to the smell of the pulp or the burners or whatever as
"the smell of money".

One qualifier - I'm curious as to the native prononciation, which is more
likely (?) to preserve the original voyageur/priest accent - moo-LAH, as in
French - than the anglicized usage represented by moolah=money in English.
What's the Grande Ronde prononciation, if any?  Anyone else?

Another option, of course, is that it's a nonsense word coined in a
mock-pidgin, and originated on a trading dock in Madagascar or Mandalay......

Mike