hoggee, hoggy

David Bergdahl einstein at FROGNET.NET
Sun Sep 19 21:15:24 UTC 2004


Clear DayDARE vol 2 defines "hoggy" as a boat laborer on the Erie
Canal--first citation given is from 1939 but no etymology is proposed.  Is
the driver of the canal animals simply presented as an animal himself?

This question is forwarded from a friend in Syracuse who writes:

<snip>The word "hoggee" is used by various canal museums as one that refers
to the
boys and men who drove the canal boat mules and horses. But none of the
literature contemporary to canal times uses the word.  The articles refer to
these workers as "drivers" or "driver boys."  I am beginning to suspect that
the author, Samuel Hopkins Adams invented the word (or perhaps his
grandfather did) or that it was used in a very regional manner until his
canal books were written in the mid-20th century.  Lionel D. Wyld who wrote
"Low Bridge! Folklore and the Erie Canal,"  (Syracuse University Press 1962)
quotes a rhyme used as a taunt, "Hoggee on the towpath/five cents a
day/picking up horseballs/to eat along the way," but his source was
"informant" Richard N. Wright, who used to be the director of the Onondaga
Historical Association.  Wright could have been influenced by the Adams
book.  Marvin Rapp in "Canal Water and Whiskey: Tall Tales from the Erie
Canal Country" (Heritage Press 1992) had a different version of the same
taunt: "Hoggee on the towpath 5 cents a day/picking up mule balls o eat
along the way./ Hoggee on the towpath, don't know what to say/walk behind a
mule's behind, all the live-long day."  He doesn't cite the source. </snip>
________________________________
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