"Kilroy was here" (AP story, 14 Nov. 1945)

[Michael Quinion]

Barry Popik wrote ...

> Over three years ago, Michael Quinion made an ADS-L post, tracking
> "Kilroy was here" to the 2 December 1945 Nevada State Journal.

Barry, and perhaps others, has been led astray by my odd British sense of
humour. When I quoted the item about Sgt. Francis J. Kilroy, Jr, and added
the comment "So now we know ...", it was to illustrate that even by that
date, competing claims to be the originator of the expression had begun to
circulate and be believed by the press. I was aware that earlier examples
of it had been recorded. Think of the terminating three dots in my comment
as my personal representation of the quizzically raised eyebrow ...


--
Michael Quinion
Editor, World Wide Words
E-mail: wordseditor at worldwidewords.org
Web: http://www.worldwidewords.org

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