dialectal "from the home" /of the home

[Baker, John]

        I recently attended two funerals in southern Kentucky.  At the first funeral, the cemetery was about six miles out of town; there was a police escort to just past the city limits, and then the funeral procession continued on its own.  At the second funeral, the cemetery was only a mile or two outside of town, and the police escort continued to the cemetery.  In both cases, it was local city police, not state police.  The people in this rural area continue the custom of stopping on the highway and waiting for the funeral procession to pass.

John Baker


-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf
Of Bethany K. Dumas
Sent: Monday, November 22, 2004 7:32 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: dialectal "from the home" /of the home


On Sun, 21 Nov 2004, Wilson Gray wrote:

>> I have assised in the burial of a number of Texans, all dead, but never
>> with the assistance of the Texas State Police. When did this
>> custom begin?
>
>Perhaps the question is, rather, "When did it end?" At my grandfather's
>funeral, the presence of the state-police escort was not considered to
>be worthy of comment. In 1956, the presence of the Texas State Police
>at a large gathering of black people would more likely have caused
>panic, let alone comment, unless it was an ordinary occurrence,
>expected under the circumstances. And an escort by the state police was
>not a service that the state of Texas would have provided to black
>people and denied to white people.

Interesting - the custom must have varied by county, The burials I
referenced began in the early 1950s.

Thanks,
Bethany