Earliest Evidence for "Ghoti"

[Jesse Sheidlower]

On Sun, Feb 01, 2004 at 11:08:30AM -0500, Fred Shapiro wrote:
> "Ghoti" as a spelling of "fish" is usually attributed to G. B. Shaw.
> However, the earliest examples I have seen do not mention Shaw's name, and
> biographies of Shaw do not give any hard evidence of his having used this.
> The earliest record of the "ghoti" spelling is in Finnegan's Wake (1941),
                                                    ^^^^^^^^^^

ITYM "Finnegans".

Jesse Sheidlower