Guys named "Buzz"

[Jonathan Lighter]

This etymology might explain some of the early "Buzzes" discovered by Doug.

  JL

Amy West <medievalist at W-STS.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Amy West
Subject: Re: Guys named "Buzz"
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I've just recently learned, and so what to share what is new to me,
that Aldrin's nickname is a family nickname given to him based on his
toddler older sister's pronunciation of brother: "buzzer" > "Buzz".
Evidently there's no connection to his father's own
flying/piloting/aeronautical work. It is weird that his mother's
maiden name was Moon.

We knew a boy named Edwin. His nickname was Ned, but being fans (as
was his family) we called him Buzz in honor of Aldrin. It didn't
stick, though.

---Amy West

>Date: Mon, 26 Feb 2007 08:32:55 -0800
>From: Jonathan Lighter
>Subject: Guys named "Buzz"
>
>"Buzz" Aldrin is actually Edwin Eugene, but distinguished forensic
>psychologist Dr. J. Buzz von Ornsteiner is alleged to be the real
>McCoy.



>
> The earliest "Buzz" I know of was U.S. Navy pilot Buz [sic]
>Sawyer, the cartoon hero who, beginning in late 1943, piloted his
>TBF Avenger dive bomber through blue Pacific skies in search of the
>wily Japanese. Sawyer's name was doubly appropriate because it
>suggested "Buzzsaw" on the one hand and connoted aeronautical and
>aerobatical "buzzing" on the other. The aerobatic sense of "buzz" is
>unrecorded by HDAS before 1944; thus the nickname "Buzz," as applied
>to men surnamed "Sawyer," may be older than the strip. (A web
>search turns up plenty, though all seem to be post-war.) On the
>other hand, Texas cartoonist (you reading this, Barry?) Roy Crane
>(1901-1977) is unlikely to have titled his comic strip with anything
>so mundane.
>
> The possibility that druggie parents of the '60s and beyond may
>have officially named the occasional kid "Buzz" for other reasons
>remains open.
>
> JL

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