Snow angel

[Jonathan Lighter]

I've asked a number of people about this over the years, and most of them insist they first heard of "snow angel" on an episode of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" broadcast in the 1970s.
One friend says she knew of it a few years earlier, but only in the form "make angels in the snow."

I certainly was unfamiliar with the term (as well as the practice) while growing up in NYC in the 1950s, when there seemed to be plenty of snow.

JL
james.callan at COMCAST.NET wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: james.callan at COMCAST.NET
Subject: Snow angel
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Turns out "snow angel" isn't in the OED, dictionary.com or m-w.com. It also turns out that "snow angel" refers to things -- like crafts -- other than the pattern you make in the snow when you lie on your back and wave your extended arms and legs.

Is this a regionalism? (I grew up in Wisconsin.) How old is the term? Are there other words for the snow game?

-- James Callan

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