yesteryear

[Jonathan Lighter]

  I'm with youse, and pretty much because othe Lone Ranger.  I can't imagine knowing the word before I started watching The Lone Ranger on TV in 1954-55.  But I do seem to recall that my instant understanding of it delighted me.  That and the "William Tell Overture."

  Regardless of the customary French application of "d'antan," "yesteryear" must have meant "yore" to all but the most pedantic readers of Rosetti's translation.  "The snows of yore" are infinitely deeper than those of "last year."

  JL


  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: sagehen
Subject: Re: yesteryear
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

>What do most Americans understand by "yesteryear"?
>According to a desktop dictionary, "yesteryear" means
>"last year". But I have always understood "yesteryear"
>to mean "times of long ago, back in history".
>
>My guess is that people came to take "yesteryear" to have
>this meaning from the introduction to the radio show, and
>later the television show, known as 'The Lone Ranger'.
>In that introduction, the announcer said,
>"Come back with us now to those thrilling days of
>yesteryear, ... with the Lone Ranger!"
>This announcement was immediately followed by
>the fast-tempo part of the William Tell overture.
>(It used to be said that an intellectual is someone
>who can listen to the William Tell overture without
>thinking of 'The Lone Ranger'.)
>
>The time reference of "yesteryear" was the era in which
>westerns were set, about the 1870s. The radio show
>must have started in the 1930s, and the TV show lasted
>into the 1950s, so in that introduction, "yesteryear" would
>have to mean "60-80 years ago".
>
>What made it possible to get people to understand
>"yesteryear" to have this altered meaning? Well,
>"yesteryear" is not an everyday word; it is semi-literary.
>Moreover, I daresay most Americans first learned the word
>"yesteryear" at a young age, from this very radio/TV western.
>Because this word was in the introduction, it was
>heard every time the show was broadcast.
>And "yesteryear", from its association with "yester(day)"
>meaning "past" and "year", can be understood from
>context. Besides, no one will stop to look it up
>just when a broadcast drama is starting.
>
>Here is a way to test out my two-bit hypothesis:
>Find somewhere in the English-speaking world
>that has not been tainted by exposure to 'The Lone Ranger'.
>If this western drama has never been broadcast in,
>say, Australia, then Australians should understand
>"yesteryear" to mean "last year", not "in the times
>of our great-grandparents".
>
>-- Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
~~~~~~~~~~~
I did listen to The Lone Ranger, as a kid, but I *think* I was acquainted
with "yesteryear" before hearing it there. I'm not sure I'd have
remembered it as part of that introductory spiel, if you hadn't brought it
up. My first association with "yesteryear" was as the customary
translation of "Ou sont les neiges d'antan?" Looking up /antan/ in
Cassell's I find it gives "yesteryear, yore" as equivalent. So go figure.
To me, now, "yesteryear" means the past in general, not just last year.
A. Murie





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