jackpot

[Sam Clements]

Some obscure researcher named Jon Lighter seems to have that from 1887, in
HDAS.

Why the OED can't make this a separate word listing, I can't understand.

Of course, Jesse, who obviously either has (1) no life or (2) has a cell
phone which mimics the "bat signal," and he magically appears here when
anything concerning OED appears.  :)

Sam Clements


----- Original Message -----
From: "George Thompson" <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Saturday, August 15, 2009 18:26
Subject: jackpot


> The current issue of Bloodhorse, a magazine devoted to thoroughbred
> racing, in its on-line form (bloodhorse.com) has an article on Bob
> Baffert, a trainer who has just been inducted into the sport's Hall of
> Fame.  He had begun his career in quarter-horse racing, and credits the
> experience with his later success with thoroughbreds.
> “It was a lot of trial and error—mostly error,” he noted. “You had to get
> to the point where you could fix problems. There was no medication. You
> used Absorbine and alcohol and rubbed those legs until the filling was
> gone. I’d rub for hours and get those legs tight while my dad sat on a
> bucket watching. I’ve seen every jackpot a horse can get himself into, and
> when a problem comes up today, I remember a horse having had it in the
> past and remember some off-the-wall remedy I learned working on those
> Quarter Horses.”
>
> This sense of "jackpot" isn't in the OED; oddly, though, among its array
> of quotations illustrating the sense of "prize", are two that certainly
> seem to really illustrate Baffert's meaning: "problem".
>
> 1959 Maclean's Mag. 4 July 34/3 Canada House receives SOS messages from
> ‘distressed Canadians’, the official designation for those who get
> themselves into various jackpots.
> [1962 Sunday Times Suppl. 10 June 10 There is always the chance that one
> or other number or artist will hit the jackpot.]
> 1963 Listener 28 Mar. 568/3 Cabinet Ministers are hauled out in front of
> the cameras and asked increasingly impertinent leading questions. A week
> or two ago Mr. Butler copped one of these jackpots from Robert Mackenzie:
> did he, or did he not, want to be Prime Minister?
>
> GAT
>
> George A. Thompson
> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
> Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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