Kook (1960)

[Bapopik at AOL.COM]

I just came across (still cleaning this mess of a home, under orders of new  
occupant) TRUE, November 1966, pg. 92, col. 2: "It stems from the Hawaiian 
word  'Kukai' which means excrement. Surfers picked up the term and applied it to 
 troublemakers and hangers-on who never went near the water. Its popularity  
spread and it now denotes all offbeats and deadbeats."
...
Interesting, but I'll still go with "cuckoo."
...
...
(OED)
kook
[prob. abbrev. of _CUCKOO_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/crossref?query_type=word&queryword=kook&first=1&max_to_show=10&single=1&sort_type=alpha&xrefword=c
uckoo&ps=a.)  a. or  _CUCKOO_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/crossref?query_type=word&queryword=kook&first=1&max_to_show=10&single=1&sort_type=alpha&xrefwor
d=cuckoo&ps=n.)  n.  3.]   
1. A  cranky, crazy, or eccentric person. Freq. attrib. or as adj.  
1960  Daily Mail 22 Aug.  4/5 A kook, Daddy-O, is a screwball who is ‘gone’ 
farther than  most. 1963  Time 4 Oct. 37 ‘Don't think that  just because he 
talked about those way-out rockets he's a kook,’ cautioned a  fellow officer. 
1964  Economist 28 Nov. 969/2  Thousands of ‘beatniks, kooks, and crackpots’. 
1965  _J.  POTTS_ (http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-p3.html#j-potts)  
Only Good Secretary (1966) ii. 26 Max is kind of a kook. He paints these kooky 
pictures. 1968  _MRS. L. B.  JOHNSON_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-j.html#mrs-l-b-johnson)  White House Diary 18 Jan. (1970) 623 Mrs. 
Hughes..said..‘I think that anybody who takes pot because  there is a war on is a kook.’ 
1968  N.Y. Times 26 Mar. 32 ‘Has it  ever occurred to you that the kook 
market has grown?’ said a United States auto  executive when asked to explain the 
growing sales of foreign cars. 1970  E. R. JOHNSON  God Keepers (1971) xv. 166 
It's  a kook clique all right. It's..a happy place. That's kooks to you cops. 
1971  Black World June 67/1 These  marchers were all probably a bunch of kooks 
like Harry always said. 1973  Publishers Weekly 25 June 68/1 A  bona fide 
kook who is never quite able to get in gear till he finally dies  paddling his 
canoe across the Atlantic.
2.  orig. U.S. A novice, or one who is inexpert, in surf-riding. Also  
attrib.  
1961  in Amer. Speech (1962) XXXVII. 150.  1966  Surfer VII. 9 This letter is 
to  protest about dumb kook girls out in the water. Ibid. 17 All most of 
[these surfers] are is a bunch of loud-mouthed kooks  who come down here and 
clutter up the beach. Ibid. 39 Malibu..was also the birthplace of the ‘kook box’, 
that  monstrosity known as the poor man's paddle board. 1971  Studies in 
English (Univ. of Cape Town) II. 25 The reason for this reticence is that surfers 
wish to  differentiate themselves from kooks, who surf badly.
...
...
_SAMPLING  OF SLANG, TEEN-AGE AND UP_ 
(http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=3&did=119098382&SrchMode=1&sid=2&Fmt=10&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=HNP&T
S=1130365742&clientId=65882) 
New York Times (1857-Current  file). New York, N.Y.: Feb 28, 1960. p. SM94 (1 
page) 
_kook._ One who is cuckoo; a nut.
...
_Article  7 -- No Title; Cool--and Dedicated _ 
(http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=58&did=575023042&SrchMode=1&sid=5&Fmt=10&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&V
Name=HNP&TS=1130365962&clientId=65882) 
JOHN FINK.  Chicago Daily Tribune (1872-1963). Chicago, Ill.: Nov  12, 1960. 
p. C6 (2 pages) 
...some call "kooks"--strange in look and  behavior--...