Boys Town or Boy's Town or Boys' Town (Mexican brothels near Texas border)

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Thu Aug 30 00:35:08 UTC 2007


You are correct, sir! It is the 1938 movie that I had in mind.

-Wilson

On 8/29/07, Arnold M. Zwicky <zwicky at csli.stanford.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Arnold M. Zwicky" <zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Boys Town or Boy's Town or Boys' Town (Mexican brothels near
>               Texas border)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Aug 29, 2007, at 9:39 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>
> > ... When he first started to tell me his war stories, I'd freak,
>
> > since I'd
> > grown up Catholic in the heyday of Father Flanagan's Boys' Town. There
> > was even a movie, which I saw, made about the place. It took a while
> > for me to adjust to the slang usage.
>
> several movies.  you're probably thinking about the 1938 movie Boys
> Town, starring Spencer Tracey and Mickey Rooney.
>
> the imdb has the tagline: The life story of a boy who was "born to be
> hung"!  [well, hanged.  just how hung mickey rooney was/is i don't
> know.]
>
> there was a 1941 sequel Men of Boys Town, with the same stars.
>
> arnold
>
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>


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-----
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