Red Carpet; Nowhere to go but up; Thin as Matzoh

[James A. Landau]

In a message dated 04/08/2001 6:14:51 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
Bapopik at AOL.COM writes:

>    "The Red Carpet Returns" by Lucius Beebe is in the NEW YORK magazine
> section of the Sunday NEW YORK HERALD TRIBUNE, 13 October 1963, pp. 14-15.
>     OED has this from 1934, but the "red carpet" treatment is well
described
> here by Beebe.  It may have originated with a train called _The 20th
Century
> Limited_.

William D. Middleton "The Grandest Terminal of Them All" _Trains_ Volume 35
Number 7, May 1975.

page 29 top of column 1 "For close to four decades after Grand Central's
completion, the great limiteds were to remain the premiere means of American
overland public transportation...every afternoon the [New York] Central's
famous maroon carpet was rolled out for the departure, usually in multiple
sections, of that doyenne of American trains, the _20th Century Limited_."

(page 27 column 2 Grand Central Terminal was opened February 2, 1913).

The above quote is not proof, but does indicate that in 1913 or soon after an
actual red or maroon carpet was in use at Grand Central Terminal, providing a
referent for the phrase "red-carpet treatment".

        - Jim Landau