"dollar per" and sacred cows

[Victor Steinbok]

Nice! I wasn't trying to look for the /earliest/ "dollar per"--it was
just an accidental catch along with what I thought was a nice use of
sacred cows for steaks. The "dollar per" comment was intended more as a
follow up to Arnold Zwicky's blog posts on truncation (Aug 29, 2009, and
March 7, 2010).

     VS-)

On 3/11/2010 2:59 PM, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 2:56 PM, Victor Steinbok<aardvark66 at gmail.com>  wrote:
>
>> "Early" truncation example from 1920 NYT? I only found this because the
>> sentence immediately preceding the "dollar per" refers to steaks from
>> sacred cows.
>>
>> http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9902E7DA173AEE32A2575BC2A9659C946195D6CF
>>
>>
>>> Why these steaks, ranging from 90 cents to $2? Are they all reverently
>>> removed from sacred cows? What mean these soups, these vegetables,
>>> these deserts, which apparently are kept from costing a *dollar per*
>>> only by tremendous will power on the part of those who compose New
>>> York's menus?
>>>
> OED's got it from 1899.
>
> 1899 G. W. PECK Peck's Uncle Ike iii. 31 Listened to a heavenly choir
> that is paid a hundred dollars per.
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>
>

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