parlo(u)r pink, pinko

[Geoffrey Nunberg]

I wonder if someone could help me trace the earliest uses of these
items. The OED gives 1910 for "parlour" in this use (in "parlour
socialist," a phrase for which JSTOR has an -or antedate for 1908)
and gives 'pink' in this sense from 1927, but gives no cite for the
collocation "parlour pink" until 1960: "1960 News Chron. 22 June 6/5
A wonderfully reactionary view of country life. It makes John Buchan
look a Œparlour pink.¹"

Similarly, the OED has one cite for 'pinko' as a noun from 1936; the
earliest cite for what they call the adjectival use is from 1957 in
"your pinko pals." (This feels to me more like an attributive use of
the noun -- cf the awkwardness of "your pals are pinko.") A 1950
JSTOR article on the vocabulary of Time magazine mentions 'pinko' as
occurring twice in 1926; I wonder if Luce was responsible for the
term.

Thanks for any help on this,

Geoff Nunberg