peops = peeps

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Tue, 27 Sep 2005 23:17:07 -0400, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:

>-----
>_Morning Oregonian_ (Portland), Oct. 29, 1873, p. 3/2
>As there will be no election until next summer, all the ballot boxes
>which belong to the several precincts in the county and city have been
>brought into the County Clerk's office for safe keeping until they are
>to be again used as receptacles in which the popular verdict of the
>"dear peops" is to be safely deposited.
>-----

Earlier still from Making of America, representing the speech of a French
musician named Monsieur Matthieu:

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Solomon Smith, 1868.
_Theatrical management in the West and South for thirty years_, p. 173/2
"I hear," said he to me, "dat in dis Cincinnati de peops very mush fond of
de musique, and de eat and de drink is _sheep_ [cheap]; dat dey have de
_cochon beaucoup_ - plenty! Trois sous de pound, and de spare-rib throw
him in, begar! and here I sal make some casting of my anchor, as de sailor
say."
http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moa;cc=moa;g=moagrp;idno=AEH1378.0001.001;view=image;seq=00000175
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--Ben Zimmer