"shade-tree mechanic", not in (some) dictionaries

[Wilson Gray]

I think that Larry, not being one of those good folks who come from
home, is just trying to get a mental picture of how the phrase came to
be. What kind of experience inspired some good old boy to invent the
phrase and why did others, hearing it, find the expression so apt,
based upon their own experience, that they picked it up and spread it
around? That is, how did the phrase come to be hip?

We homeboys, OTOH, are so familiar with the circumstances that gave
rise to this phrase that trying to deconstruct it is like trying to
explain what "is" is.

-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Mark Twain



On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 8:13 AM, Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at bellsouth.net> wrote:
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> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "shade-tree mechanic", not in (some) dictionaries
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> What is the issue? Â The widespread use of the phrase?
>
> I have lived all over the US, and, in one circumstance or another, have
> heard the term very often.
>
> Bill Palmer
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Stephen Goranson" <goranson at DUKE.EDU>
> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 6:07 AM
> Subject: Re: "shade-tree mechanic", not in (some) dictionaries
>
>
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>> header -----------------------
>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Stephen Goranson <goranson at DUKE.EDU>
>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "shade-tree mechanic", not in (some) dictionaries
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Quoting Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>:
>>
>>> At 4:56 PM -0500 2/24/09, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>>>> On Tue, Feb 24, 2009 at 4:27 PM, Laurence Horn
>>>> <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Â Emmylou Harris's new album "All I Intended To Be" contains a
>>>>> Â particularly fine song "Broken Down Man's Lament", which contains a
>>>>> Â line I was sure I was mishearing, but it turns out I wasn't:
>>>>>
>>>>> Â "I was a good shade-tree mechanic."
>>>>>
>>>>> Â More fully, the quatrain in question runs as follows, confirmed by
>>>>> Â both the enclosed lyrics and various web sites:
>>>>>
>>>>> Â ======================
>>>>> Â I was a good shade-tree mechanic
>>>>> Â So I sent myself to school
>>>>> Â They smoothed out my rough edges
>>>>> Â In my hand they put new tools
>>>>> Â ======================
>>>>>
>>>>> Â No help from the usual sources, but urbandictionary.com comes
>>>>> through nicely:
>>>> [snip]
>>>>
>>>> Barry Popik has it on his site with citations back to 1942:
>>>>
>>>> http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/texas/entry/shade_tree_mechanic/
>>>>
>>>> In a 2005 thread here I noted some other variants, including "shade-tree
>>>> engineer" and "shade-tree philosopher".
>>>>
>>>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0506C&L=ads-l&P=15454
>>>
>>> I obviously had plumb forgot that thread, and hadn't checked Barry's
>>> site. Â Is the idea that you're doing the car-repair, or engineering,
>>> or philosophizing in the comfort of your old shade-tree? Â Since there
>>> seem to be no dictionary entries, it's hard to get a bead on the
>>> etymology. Â Or, for that matter, the relevant isogloss--it is really
>>> localized to Texan and points west, or found elsewhere in the south?
>>> We need to get us some shade-tree mechanics in Connecticut!
>>>
>>> LH
>>
>> The Cambridge MA Car Talk guys (at least one of them) on NPR used the
>> term.
>>
>> Stephen
>>>
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>>>
>>
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