Further Antedating of "Black Hole" (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Mullins, Bill AMRDEC]

Classification:  UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

Fred -- I hope you will forward this to the OED  ( oed3 at oup.com ).  I
got a nice email from Ms. Charlton there, who was on the verge of
looking up "Black Hole" when she received my email.

I unfortunately just lost access to JSTOR (a certain university, of
which I am not a student, just tightened up their access security . . .
. ), and was not able to look there.  I did search the Astrophysics Data
System digital library at Harvard, and found nothing there (
http://adswww.harvard.edu/ ).

Bill

> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society
> [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Shapiro, Fred
> Sent: Wednesday, April 16, 2008 1:00 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Further Antedating of "Black Hole"
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Shapiro, Fred" <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Further Antedating of "Black Hole"
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> -----------------
>
> Here's a more notable antedating, since it casts into serious
> question whether Wheeler really was the coiner:
>
> 1964 _Science News Letter_ 18 Jan. 39 (JSTOR)  Because a
> degenerate star is so dense, its gravitational field is very
> strong.  According to Einstein's general theory of
> relativity, as mass is added to a degenerate star a sudden
> collapse will take place and the intense gravitational field
> of the star will close in on itself.  Such a star then forms
> a "black hole" in the universe.
>
> Fred Shapiro
> Editor
> Yale Book of Quotations
>
>
>
> ________________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> Behalf Of Mullins, Bill AMRDEC [Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2008 3:08 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: black hole antedating (UNCLASSIFIED)
>
> Classification:  UNCLASSIFIED
> Caveats: NONE
>
> Physicist John Wheeler, age 96, just died.  His NYT obit
> (among others) credits him with coining the term "black hole".
>
> OED has 1968.
>
> "'Black Holes' May Be Key to Universe" (Associated Press)
> _The Hartford Courant_; Dec 30, 1967; pg. 13A col 1 "The
> universe, said Dr. John A. Wheeler, may be dotted with "black
> holes," the remnants of stars that have collapsed upon
> themselves, matter so tightly packed that it no longer can be
> seen, small pockets of something that look like nothing."
> Classification:  UNCLASSIFIED
> Caveats: NONE
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
>
Classification:  UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org