blacktop/macadam

[Peter A. McGraw]

--On Friday, December 6, 2002 3:07 PM -0800 Peter Richardson
<prichard at linfield.edu> wrote:

>
> Same for Illinois in the 50s. I wouldn't blink a toad's eye if I heard it
> today, though, even if it might sound odd to others. My mother,
> incidentally, would have said "macadam," even if that's strictly something
> different from blacktop/asphalt. (She was from Portland, where there's
> still a street named Macadam--whether after the famous Scot or not, I
> don't know, but I doubt it was named after its material; just imagine "I
> live on Concrete Street.")
>
> PR

I've always called it blacktop and still would today if the subject
happened to come up.  A note on "macadam": my grandmother and the great
aunt who lived in Oregon told about teasing their sister (who lived in
Oklahoma like my grandmother) for calling that street "MacaDAM."  So
apparently the term was unfamiliar to her, whether because it was new then
or because it was used in Oregon but not, or at least not colloquially, in
Oklahoma.

Peter Mc.

****************************************************************************
                               Peter A. McGraw
                   Linfield College   *   McMinnville, OR
                            pmcgraw at linfield.edu