dutchmen

[George Thompson]

[a block of marble, needed to patch and repair the stone facade of the
Met Life building near Madison Square, was found at an abandoned
quarry]
. . . it ultimately yielded 250 of the custom-fitted repair pieces that
stone restorers call "dutchmen."
NY Times, Jun4 4, 2006, section 14 [the City section].p. 1 col. 4

Also, with reference to Bill Mullins' recent poting "If it's not in
the dictionary, it must not be a word":
Looking in Proquest's NYTimes files for something else, I stumbled on
this: "GETTING INTO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY; Every New Word Must Pass
an Inquisition to be Admitted to the Select 500,000."  By F.A. AUSTIN.
New York Times, June 3, 1923. S[unday] Magazine] p. 11
In addition to the text, there is a fine illustration of some words
grovelling abjectly at the feet of a lexicographer, hoping that he
will benignly smile upon them and admit them to his dictionary.  (At
first glance I thought the lexicographer bore a striking resemblance
to our Jesse Sheidlower, but it must be co-incidental; he probably
wasn't that well known in the field in 1923.)

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

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