nine 'yards notes

[Grant Barrett]

Dude, give it a rest. That particular hobbyhorse is tired, won't
race, and is pointed toward the glue factory.

Grant Barrett
gbarrett at worldnewyork.org
http://www.doubletongued.org/

On Aug 14, 2006, at 07:13, Stephen Goranson wrote:

> Quoting Sam Clements <SClements at NEO.RR.COM>:
>
>> 13 Nov 1967 _Pacific Stars and Stripes_  pg 11?
>>
>> "Spec. 4 Robert G. Helton, 64th Quartermaster Bin.--"Ann
>> Margaret---all the way.  She's got everything going for her.  She
>> dances, sings, acts---the whole nine yards."
>
> This is good additional Vietnam-related American speech data to
> work with. He
> tells why she is his favorite actress. Because she's got
> everything: she
> dances, sings, acts. Please note that dancing, singing, and acting are
> different things, though all useful for an actress. Earlier, in the
> book that
> includes visits to and photographs of Montagnards, we had the
> different-but-related things in service provided by a barber
> (haircut, shave,
> massage). And we have Mercy Belle's many beds, many loctions or
> positions or
> sexual favors or whatever she offered. We have, in Strawberry
> Soldier (written
> by a Special Forces vet who worked with Montagnards) uniform
> decorations,
> multicolored array. We have housekeepers for GIs that perform a
> list of
> services. There is a pattern here, These are related but non-
> identical things
> ('yards). Plus, the list isn't always or even usually discretely
> nine of these
> things; that part got lost early.
>
> Therefore, it becomes exceedingly improbable, vanishlingly small in
> liklihood,
> that 9 units of the exact same thing are involved in this phrase.
> For example,
> not nine 36-inch unit yards. Some things (yards) that comprises a
> set, an
> array, the full or whole compliment. This arose circa 1966, probably
> explicitly
> in 1966. Robert L. Mole wrote of and named and described for GIs
> nine related
> but not identical Montagnard tribes in I Corps area, in 1966. To
> get them all
> as allies would be to achieve the full cohort of allies there, the
> full/whole
> nine yards.
>
> Those who might await, say, a citation of "the whole nine 'gnards"
> may well be
> asking too much before considering the remarkable confluence of the
> already-available evidence of this phrase including the odd and
> ephemeral
> usage--but in the precise time, place, and population of origin--of
> calling
> some groups of people yards, the claimed political incorrectness
> (see the
> interned Vietnam Study Group "Great Montagnard Debate") of which may
> additionally help explain how the origin soon became forgotten.
>
> best,
> Stephen Goranson
> http://www.duke.edu/~goranson
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org