square from Delaware (1939)

[Stephen Goranson]

Quoting Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>:

> On Wed, Sep 3, 2008 at 4:53 PM, Benjamin Zimmer
> <bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
>>
>> On Wed, Sep 3, 2008 at 4:32 PM, Jesse Sheidlower <jester at panix.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> On Wed, Sep 03, 2008 at 03:57:30PM -0400, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>>>> ---
>>>> 1939 _New York Amsterdam News_ [Dan Burley's "Backdoor Stuff"] 27 May
>>>> 20/1 "Lawd! I'm a square from Delaware, a Lane from Spokane, a killer
>>>> from Manila and a Home from Rome," Allen Drew beats out.
>>>> ---
>>>> 1940 _New York Amsterdam News_ 2 Mar. 21/2 So don't be the "square
>>>> from Delaware," just lace up your boots and "dig this jive."
>>>> ---
>>>>
>>>> Also c. 1940, Fats Waller released a song called "(You're a) Square
>>>> From Delaware" (Bluebird B-10730, B-side of "Send Me Jackson"). And I
>>>> believe the expression shows up in the 1941 movie _Ball of Fire_. Is
>>>> this the origin for "square" = 'unhip person'?
>>>
>>> Here are the two examples of _square_ in the shooting script:
>>>
>>> 1941 C. Brackett & 'B. Wilder' _Ball of Fire_ (film script) 28
>>> All right, gates. All right, squares, plant your frames solid
>>> in your chairs and latch onto the roller coaster. We're going
>>> through the night life of Manhattan--every juice joint.
>>>
>>> 1941 C. Brackett & 'B. Wilder' _Ball of Fire_ (film script) 35
>>> A professor!.. Just a square from Delaware.
>>
>> So do we have anything earlier for "square" = 'unhip person (from
>> Delaware or elsewhere)'? The 1939 Amst News cite doesn't imply
>> unhipness, but the 1940 one certainly does.

Two hit-or-miss squares.
Might "square music" have been in use early enough for jazz to be contrasted
with it?
If a square was seen as fitting Delaware but not Harlem, perhaps consider the
following, related to OED's 1836/7 quote from A.W. Fondblanque. I didn't find
the claimed mention by Jeremy Taylor.

THE POLITICAL EXAMINER
The Examiner (London, England), Sunday, November 6, 1836; Issue 1501.
LYNDHURST versus PEEL. [Unsigned. By Fonblanque?]

[page 1 and/or 699?? 2nd col. last paragraph]
Jeremy Taylor says that the world is a board with peg-holes, some square and
some round, and that certain men, fitted for one state of things and not for
another, are square pegs which get into round holes, and round pegs which get
into square holes. Nothing can adjust them to their stations, or fits
them with
any firmness of uprightness. Change their positions, and each is set
right; but
the change is impossible. So it is with Sir Robert Peel and Lord
Lyndhurst. Sir
Robert Peel was a smooth round peg, in a sharp-cornered square hole, and Lord
Lord [sic] Lyndhurst is a rectangular square-cut peg, in a smooth round hole.

Stephen Goranson
http://www.duke.edu/~goranson

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