fan the ozone (1890), ozoned (1903)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Sat, 21 May 2005 00:16:04 -0400, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
wrote:

>At 8:53 PM -0400 5/20/05, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>>
>>So here is the historical progression, as far as I can tell:
>>
>>1. batter "fans the air" (or later "the ozone")
>>2a. batter "fans out" (on analogy with "strikes out")
>>2b. batter "fans"
>>3a. pitcher "fans out" batter (on analogy with "strikes out")
>>3b. pitcher "fans" batter (shortened like 2b)
>>
>>By the time 3b emerged, the original image of the batter "fanning the
>>air" with his bat was apparently superceded by the image of the
pitcher
>>"fanning" the batter with the ball.  (This might just be a post-hoc
>>rationalization of a slightly opaque idiom.)
>
>Right, I was also thinking after I posted that "fan the air" was a
>plausible source for both "fan" and of course expressive
>substitutions like "fan the ozone", which I'd never heard before, and
>I was surprised none of the OED or HDAS cites had it.  (I was equally
>unfamiliar with "fan out".)  But part of the loss of transparency
>must have led to "fan" being reinterpreted as 'strike out', whether
>by swinging or taking a called third strike (forward or backward K,
>if you prefer).  Not much air (or ozone) gets fanned when the batter
>is caught looking, although it may turn blue if he doesn't care for
>the call.

The same sort of reinterpretation happened a bit later with "whiff", which
originated in the same evocation of a batter fruitlessly swinging and
hitting nothing but air.  There was even an intermediary "whiff out", as
in this couplet from a verse by Grantland Rice called "Modern Baseball
Lingo" (_Washington Post_, Jan 9, 1910, Sporting Section, p. 3/6):

 "Whiffed out" refers to one who stands up at the plate and vainly
 Takes a wallop at the ozone as he jaws the ump profanely.

Eventually it was the pitcher doing the whiffing.  Interestingly, both
"whiff" and "fan" have been transferred to other sports where a player
misses a ball (golf), puck (hockey), or target (bowling).  But only in
baseball (or softball) can one player "whiff" or "fan" another player.


--Ben Zimmer