brick-and-mortar

[Paul McFedries]

I used "brick-and-mortar" as the Word Spy yesterday, mostly because it
has been seen quite a lot in recent years thanks to its nice contrast
with "online" and "virtual." I checked Lexis-Nexis for the earliest cite
and came up with one from July 20, 1973 (which was actually
"bricks-and-mortar"). However, a subscriber wrote to me and said he was
sure he'd heard the phrase used in the sixties. Can anyone confirm this
or provide an earlier cite?

Thanks

Paul
Word Spy: http://www.logophilia.com/WordSpy/