"Gentleman from Odessa (TX)" (=SOB) (1936)
Bapopik at AOL.COM
Bapopik at AOL.COM
Wed Nov 8 23:15:18 UTC 2006
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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