"cat-head" = large apple (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Jonathan Lighter]

I remember hearing "cathead biscuit" in 1974.  It came with red-eye gravy.

JL

On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 4:41 PM, victor steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Poster:       victor steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "cat-head" = large apple (UNCLASSIFIED)
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>
> I just got--literally minutes ago--my second (used) copy of DARE I in
> the mail (my original copy is in storage and I can't access it
> easily). "Cathead 2. large lumpy biscuit" cites Mencken from 2nd
> supplement to AL in 1948. But "Cathead 1." is "a woman's breast",
> going back to 1805. Might explain the giant apple connection. Then,
> again, it might not...
>
> VS-)
>
> On 9/13/10, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC <Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
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> > Poster:       "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
> > Subject:      Re: "cat-head" = large apple (UNCLASSIFIED)
> >
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> >
> > Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
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> >
> > Google Books has "cat head biscuit" from 1939 in American Speech.  Dunno
> > if it's in DARE, but I can't find it in OED.
> >
> >
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> > Behalf Of
> >> George Thompson
> >> Sent: Friday, September 10, 2010 4:12 PM
> >> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> >> Subject: "cat-head" = large apple
> >>
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> >> -
> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster:       George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
> >> Subject:      "cat-head" = large apple
> >>
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > ------
> >> -
> >>
> >> Four apples, called cat-head were exhibited last week to the editor of
> > the
> >> Portland Advertiser weighing a pound each.
> >> Morning Courier & New-York Enquirer, October 17, 1832, p. 2, col. 3
> >>
> >> Neither OED nor DARE has cat-head is this sense.
> >>
> >> GAT
> >>
> >> George A. Thompson
> >> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
> > Univ.
> >> Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
> >>
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