antedating bitching (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Victor Steinbok]

Not predating the other 2 I just posted, but confirming the general
sentiment and context--/and/, this time, with a firm date! [GB full view]

http://goo.gl/kJigR
The Rotarian, Sep 1945
Now That I'm Home. By Captain Darrel L. Brady. p. 12
> Frankly, I'm doing what we call "bitching" in the service. You perhaps
> are fed up with it. In the service we know it is a wholesome sign of
> normal morale as long as the men keep "bitching." When they stop, we
> look for trouble. So while I am at it I'll go on to air one of the
> biggest gripes of the men doing the fighting.

I really should not have pulled the trigger so fast on this bunch. I am
sure the date will get pushed down further by close inspection of
newspaper archives.

There is also an intriguing item from 1846, but it needs to be
investigated further...

     VS-)

On 12/3/2010 2:55 PM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
> Further still, but completely unverified.
>
> http://goo.gl/RGyKU
> Very truly ours: Letters from America's fighting men. James Waterman Wise
>> The second, if not descriptive is forceful--"bitching." Any kick you
>> have, when given to expression is "bitching." You "bitch" about this,
>> you "bitch" about that, so you are "bitching" again. Bitching is a
>> good thing; nice safety valve when you are fed up. Of course when
>> overdone it is a pain.
>> ...
>> Any time a soldier stops bitching, there is something wrong and time
>> to investigate.
>
> Both GB and the Harvard catalog have the date as 1943. But that does
> not to be the date on the cover in GB, although the image is too small
> to tell. Worldcat gave no other records.
>
>     VS-)
>
> On 12/3/2010 2:47 PM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
>> New Yorker, 1945 [date confirmed intrinsically in GB, but neither
>> date nor quote verified on paper]
>>
>> http://goo.gl/jEiQm
>> [snippet only]
>>> ... comedy entitled "Quit Your Bitchin'."
>>
>> The story is about "Major General Donald H. Connelly's Persian Gulf
>> Command", if that helps verification.
>>
>>     VS-)
>>
>> On 12/3/2010 2:30 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC wrote:
>>> OED sense bitch v2 Derivatives "bitching" n 1953
>>>
>>> _California Tech_ [student newspaper of California Institute of
>>> Technology] Vol L #23 4/14/1949 p 2 col 6
>>> http://caltechcampuspubs.library.caltech.edu/273/1/1949_04_14_50_23.pdf
>>> "John Rogers, however, was at said Theatre Party with Barbie, whom
>>> he as
>>> fascinated *(26) with his incessant bitching about the njustices [sic]
>>> of this cruel world." ["*(26)" is a footnote in the original text]
>>>
>>> ...

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