"Gentleman from Odessa (TX)" (=SOB) (1936)

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I looked from "Gentleman from Odessa" in HDAS ("your one-stop source for  
American slang"), but alas, it's not there!
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_http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/texas/entry/gentleman_from_odessa_tx/_ 
(http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/texas/entry/gentleman_from_odessa_tx/) 
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Entry from November 08, 2006 
“Gentleman from Odessa (TX)”
 
"Gentleman from Odessa” is a euphemism. Supposedly, there are no gentlemen in 
 Odessa, TX. 

Naturally, _“Son  of a Bitch Stew”_ 
(http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/texas/entry/son_of_a_bitch_stew_son_of_a_gun_stew/)  is sometimes called “
Gentleman from Odessa.” 


_Google  Books_ 
(http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN1417992204&id=Wxd7J7jOy5EC&pg=PA66&lpg=PA66&dq="gentleman+from+odessa"&ie=ISO-8859-1&sig=sP9J7kLqfU--
hOgFX7VOFT90AMc\)  
I Give You Texas! 
500 Jokes of the Lone Star  State 
by Boyce House 
San Antonio: Naylor Company 
1943 
Pg.  66: 
“The gentleman from Odessa” is a term frequently heard in West Texas.  This 
explanation by the inhabitant of a rival town: 

“Have you ever  wanted to call a man a so-and-so in mixed company? Well, a 
so-and-so would be a  gentleman in Odessa.” 

So far from resenting the term, frequently a  citizen from that town will 
smilingly introduce himself as “a gentleman from  Odessa.” 

1 November 1936, Abilene (TX) Morning Reporter-News,  “Odessans Give Facts to 
Show Its Recovery,” pg. 11: 
They used to call him  the Duke of Wellington. Now he is the “Gentleman from 
Odessa.” West Texans know  it isn’t considered polite to call a man a 
gentleman from Odessa, but Ward  doesn’t mind. It’s just a joke. 

The Texas Cookbook 
by Arthur  and Bobbie Coleman 
New York: A. A. Wyn 
1949 
Pg. 45: 
And then  there is the way that is all Texas’ own: the original 
Son-of-a-Bitch Stew. It  grew up on the far ranches, where cowbrutes are the main source of 
food. But no  one should let its apparent sparseness deceive him. The 
Son-of-a-Bitch Stew  is well-named—it is just that, in the admiring sense. 

This recipe is  straight off Uncle Jim’s range, out in the Pecos Country, 
exactly as Aunt Nannie  gave it to us. Aunt Nannie ought to know. She has been 
cooking this stew and  other good food for cowpokes since we were yearlings, 
more or less. Of  course, these quantities have been citified. Aunt Nannie is 
more used to fixing  for a couple of dozen hungry hands than for a family. 

Pecos  Son-of-a-Bitch Stew 
Throw into the pot 1 pound of neck meat cut in small  pieces, 1 heart cut up, 
the brains, all the marrow-gut, a (Pg. 46--ed.) little  of the liver, salt, 
pepper, and chiles. Start in cold water.  Cook  slowly until done, about 6 or 7 
hours. When the meat is almost done, add 1 large  can of tomato juice, if 
desired. Feeds about 8.  
For the edification of those who may be dubious about marrow-gut, it is not  
an intestine. It is a milk-secreting tract found only in calves, and it 
imparts  to a stew a delicious flavor all its own, without which the stew is nothing 
like  so distinctive. Here is another version of the Son-of-a-Bitch Stew, 
which Jack  Thornton says out in the country where he ranched for many years is 
called  “Gentleman from Odessa” (Odessa, Texas, of course)—nobody we ever met 
seems to  know why—but for the mollification of gentlemen from Odessa, he 
smiled when he  said it. In fact, he laughed out loud.  

14 August 1966, Chicago  Tribune, “How about a bowl of chili?” by Robert 
Cromie, pg. P4” 
THE  BOOK ("A Bowl of Red” by Frank X. Tolbert—ed.) DEALS WITH the chili 
peppers  known as “grains of Paradise,” gives chili history and legend, lists 
the  well-known “chili heads”—past and present [including O. Henry and Will 
Rogers],  discusses canned chili and chili powder, tamales and enchiladas, 
various beans,  and even “The Gentleman from Odessa” [a place which reputedly had 
none] or “S.  O. B. stew.” 

21 August 1973, Odessa (TX) American, pg. B1:  
The chili fracus will be simultaneously conducted with the International  
Son-Of-A-Gun Stew Rendezvous. 

The stew in question, also named the “the  Gentleman from Odessa stew” was 
created in Odessa. 

8 August 2002,  Doylestown (PA) Intelligencer, Commentary by Molly Ivins, pg. 
A7: 
And  who should pop up to defeat him but our very own, very special, Sen. 
Phil Gramm.  The gentleman from Odessa (that’s an old Texas expression that means 
something  else) blocked the attempt to expense stock options. 

 

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