skunked

[Gerald Cohen]

   My thanks to George Cole for the item below, which I now share with ads-l.

---Gerald Cohen

>Date: Tue, 05 Mar 2002
>From: GSCole <gscole at ark.ship.edu>
>To: Gerald Cohen <gcohen at umr.edu>
>Subject: ..skunked..
>
>Gerald,
>I might be off the path here, but in looking through the MOA (U. of
>Michigan) database, I found the following, relative to 'skunked'.  Don't
>know if it translates into a sports usage or not.
>
>http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moa&cc=moa&xc=1&sid=c6756a597700e55555da88e47f19029d&q1=skunked&idno=AJK3780.0001.001&view=image&seq=00000113
>
>". . . said she knew I could play better, if I would try; and set her
>chequers again.  But again I had no better success--she 'skunked' me a
>second time."
>
>"She would try it once more; and I should try to do better.  Well,
>madam, I will use what skill I have.  But, alas ! she 'skunked' me the
>third time ! and, in total despair, put her board and chequers away, and
>went back to the card-table."
>
>From:  Memoirs of the life of Nathaniel Stacy, preacher of the gospel of
>universal grace..., by Nathaniel Stacy, p.109 (1850).
>
>=================
>
>http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moa&cc=moa&xc=1&sid=c6756a597700e55555da88e47f19029d&q1=skunked&idno=AJX7261.0001.001&view=image&seq=00000358
>
>"After which, no doubt, the prayers of congregations go up more readily
>to heaven, because they have no longer to fight a passage through a
>putrid roof of vapors overhanging the church, and of which the steeple
>is the pillar.  They are not skunked by vested interests, reminding them
>of the dead, or tied like coffins to their flowing robes."
>
>From:  The human body and its connection with man, illustrated by the
>principal organs.  By James John Garth Wilkinson, p.356 (1851).
>
>=================
>
>Don't know if chequers is a 'sport' or not.  Both publications tend to
>have a religious focus.  Perhaps 'skunked' is an acceptable replacement
>for a stronger term?
>
>George Cole
>Shippensburg University