"coony" adj. = sly, cunning, 1910

[George Thompson]

Alright, damn it, I will assert it: raccoons are sly and clever.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
Date: Wednesday, February 3, 2010 9:11 pm
Subject: Re: "coony" adj. = sly, cunning, 1910
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU

> At 2/3/2010 08:55 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >HDAS has _coony_, "sly," from 1899.
>
> So do we think, as George Thompson hints but does not come right out
> and assert, that "coony" = 'sly' comes from the sly raccoon?
>
> Joel
>
>
> >JL
> >
> >
> >On Wed, Feb 3, 2010 at 8:21 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> >
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > > -----------------------
> > > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > > Subject:      Re: "coony" adj. = sly, cunning, 1910
> > >
> > >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > Alison, apology accepted.  But as to bald like a raccoon, I have that
> > > on the best authority -- the OED's definition of "coony a.", under
> > > "coon, n."  ... Oops, perhaps they're wrong -- they've spelt it "racoon"!
> > >  :-)
> > >
> > > Joel
> > >
> > > At 2/3/2010 07:02 PM, Alison Murie wrote:
> > > >>~~~~~~~~~~~~
> > > >>' "bald" like a raccoon??'  Coons ain't bald.  Far from it.  'Possums
> > > >>look bald, but aren't.   Perhaps the meaning of "coony" is really
> > > >>cunning, which would be more appropriate altogether.
> > > >>AM
> > > >~~~~~~~~~~
> > > >Ooops.  Somehow I missed para 2 in Joel's post.  I'm sorting
> through a
> > > >mountain of backlogged mail.  I was away from my desk for ten days
> > > >getting a bad hip replaced & being whipped into a semblance of normal
> > > >functioning by a crew of therapists.  Medicare is wonderful.
> (Only it
> > > >didn't get me to read my mail more carefully.)
> > > >AM
> > >
> > > ------------------------------------------------------------
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> > >
> >
> >
> >
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