square from Delaware (1939)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Tue, Sep 23, 2008 at 9:30 AM, Tom Dalzell <slangman at pacbell.net> wrote:
>
> Sometimes we neglect the obvious - present company included.
>
> Square: an un-hip person.
> Cab Calloway: The New Cab Calloway's Cat-Ologue (Revised 1939 edition)

Yep, I missed this in my first go-round, but it came up in a related
thread on Sep. 4:

http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0809A&L=ADS-L&P=R7210

I'm still wondering if "square from Delaware" could have preceded
plain old "square", or at least brought the unhip sense to prominence.


--Ben Zimmer

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