Pickle

[David Metevia]

I live in the Tri City area (Midland, Bay City, Saginaw).  There are
many cucumber farms in northern Bay County, although the local
pickling plants are long gone.

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 8:21 AM, Steve Kl.<stevekl at gmail.com> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Steve Kl." <stevekl at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Pickle
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>
> Out of curiosity, what part of Michigan are you from (I assume Michigan
> because of 'chartermi')?
> I grew up southwest of Flint, my grandparents were farmers. My father had a
> huge garden and we grew tons of cukes, but I never heard any of them call
> small cucumbers pickles. Are you up near the Thumb? For some reason I have a
> vague recollection that were large cucumber crops up that way, and I'm
> wondering if this is a term that people who deal with cucumbers in large
> quantities used.
>
> On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 8:03 AM, David Metevia <djmetevia at chartermi.net>wrote:
>
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       David Metevia <djmetevia at CHARTERMI.NET>
>> Subject:      Pickle
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> I don't have access to the OED at the moment, but looked at m-w.com
>> for a definition of pickle.  In my part of the world, folks regularly
>> refer to small size cucumbers as pickles.  A gardener grows these
>> pickles; the farmer's market sells these pickles.  They are referring
>> to the raw vegetable. Presumably this is an extension of the word as
>> the intent is that the cucumbers will be further processed into
>> pickles.
>>
>> Yet, the MW definition only gets as close to that meaning as the final
>> product:
>>
>> 3 : an article of food that has been preserved in brine or in vinegar;
>> specifically : a cucumber that has been so preserved
>>
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