weenie, wonkie (1955), wonk (1956)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

OED2 has "weenie" in the 'nerd' sense from 1963 and "wonk" from 1962.  I
believe Fred Shapiro has a 1954 cite for "wonk" from Time Magazine, though
I can't find it in the archive.


http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=489487
Harvard Crimson, October 18, 1955
Three articles billed by Holiday as "the most infuriating ever published"
probably will arouse little wrath when the magazine reaches Square
newsstands this morning.
Ostensibly an explanation of the "naturally superior" Ivy intellect for
people from west of the Alleghanies, the articles vary from a serious
appraisal of the Ivy League education to a less high-minded account of the
social life of Harvard "wonkies" and their Princeton and Yale
counterparts, "ayools" and "weenies."
Former CRIMSON editor John Sack '51, in a story titled "Ivy Social
Pastimes," sets down the tenets of "unwonkyism" and how he hopes he
attained it during his years in the College.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=499301
Harvard Crimson, October 06, 1956
At Yale, in fact, those slightly academically or socially unaccepted
students receive names such as "weenies" or "turkeys;" at Harvard they are
occasionally dubbed "wonks;" and even at Wellesley students are apt to
meet "Peter Pans."

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=157856
Harvard Crimson, August 08, 1957
"Ha! What a weenie," he sneered to the girl, giving a powerfully superior
smile in Vag's direction. ...
"Hmm, a weenie. Imagine that," Vag mused sadly as he drove down Mem Drive
toward Boston.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=118430
Harvard Crimson, September 27, 1957
Up at school it was always tacitly assumed that everyone should be getting
a liberal education, and those who were not doing so were either ignored,
or dubbed by some contemptuous term such as "wonk" or "weenie."


--Ben Zimmer