Antedating "the yips" OED 1963-->1943 :: Fwd: "yips" - Word of the Day from the OED

[Victor Steinbok]

  Many thanks to Garson for completing this thread. I left it hanging by
not following up with periodicals and he dutifully explored that option,
coming up with some nice quotations.

It seems rather definitive from all this that even if Tommy Armour did
not originate the expression, he certainly was a focal point for it, at
least in golf. The expression may or may not have existed separately
from golf, but it would not be surprising if other golfers picked it up
from Armour. Not only Sneed, but also Bobby Jones, in his golfing
biography, used the expression. I believe, Jones's book was listed by GB
under 1960.

OK, here it is:

http://bit.ly/aF00yh
> It is a manner of freezing and is well known to tournament players as
> a form of the "yips.

[WorldCat lists it as the 1st ed., Doubleday, although it's been
reprinted well into the 1990s.]

     VS-)

On 10/1/2010 4:11 AM, Garson O'Toole wrote:
> Here is a cite a couple years earlier written by the same sports
> columnist. Once again the golfer Tommy Armour is featured. The
> journalist, Grantland Rice, has placed the term yips within quotes:
>
> Cite: 1936 January 14, The (Baltimore) Sun, "Hagen Predicts Faster
> Golf This Year Than Ever Before" by Grantland Rice, Page 11, Column 7,
> Baltimore, Maryland. (ProQuest)
>
>                        "Yips" Got Him
>
> It was Tommy Armour who said that golf would be the greatest
> competition in the world - the finest of all sporting tests - if it
> wasn't for putting.
>
> "When those nerves in the wrists begin to hop," Armour said, "there is
> nothing to be done about it not even by a Hagen or a Jones, a Vardon
> or anyone else. When the 'yips' set in you are gone. Bobby Jones never
> knew what the 'yips' were until his Augusta tournaments and then he
> told me he would just as soon be nicked by a rattlesnake."
>
> Garson
>
> Garson O'Toole wrote
>> Thanks for posting about this interesting word-of-the-day, Victor.
>> Based on the great cites that you found I formulated a query and was
>> able to push the date back a bit further. In the 1938 newspaper
>> article below the professional golfer Tommy Armour is interviewed and
>

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