ranchburger, Big Onion antedating (sort of), eggcorns

[Wilson Gray]

On 11/12/07, JAMES A. LANDAU Netscape. Just the Net You Need.
<JJJRLandau at netscape.com> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "JAMES A. LANDAU Netscape. Just the Net You Need."
>               <JJJRLandau at NETSCAPE.COM>
> Subject:      ranchburger, Big Onion antedating (sort of), eggcorns
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Sun, 11 Nov 2007 14:18:31 Barry Popik <bapopik at GMAIL.COM>
> wrote on the subject of Ranch Dressing
>
> "Also of interest is the "ranch burger," inspired nowadays by the
> "ranch" name. "
>
> It is of no great etymological importance, but back in the carhop era in Louisville Ky there was a local restaurant chain known as the "Ranch House" whose signature item was the "ranchburger", somewhat similar to the Big Mac or the Big Boy.
>
>
>
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> On Sunday 11 Nov 2007 14:29:00 -0500  Doug Harris <cats22 at FRONTIERNET.NET> added to ADS's eggcorn collection with "And it might be a good idea to amend that definition to add something like the phrase ". . . but has no ingredient from a type agricultural facility fitting the traditional definition of a ranch -- i.e. a place where _lifestock_, as opposed to plants, are the main business."

FWIW, I've noticed many instances in speech of "lifes" as the plural
of "life": "After they had been married for a while, she was surprised
that their _lifes_ were not perfect."

-Wilson

>
>
> And also the eggcorn database might be interested in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, which city is, so I am told, named after the mussels that grow on the shoals in the Tennessee River.
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> On  Sun, 11 Nov 2007 19:34:00  "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" gcohen at UMR.EDU wrote
>
> "After my posting on "Big Onion" yesterday (Saturday) I belatedly
> checked an obvious source, namely Barry Popik's excellent website
> (barrypopik.com), and below my signoff I present his entry on "Big
> Onion." The entry clarifies that "Big Onion" (NYC) was almost
> non-existent  prior to the 1991 "Big Onion" Walking Tours and even
> afterwards never caught on.  Everything about Cassidy's treatment of
> this term points either to breathtaking scholarly sloppiness or to a
> hoax."
>
> Louis Untermeyer  The Wonderful Adventures of Paul Bunyan  New York:The Heritage Press, 1945 pages 58-60 tells about Paul Bunyan's and Hot Biscuit Slim's discovery of the Big Onion River.
>
>                          James A. Landau
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