"stinkfinger"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Could be Goldfinger's unsuccessful brother.

  JL

George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: George Thompson
Subject: "stinkfinger"
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Another tidbit from the gutter press.

Stinkfinger. [signature to a letter to the editor] The Flash, October
31, 1841 (I:1) p. 3, col. 4

OED (to play at stinkfinger): 1903, 1934; Cassell’s 2nd: late 19C

There is nothing in the text of the letter to make a direct connection
with playing at stinkfinger; just the same. . . .

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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