brown-bagging

[William Palmer]

In the US Navy during my career (and maybe today, but I'm too out of touch
to know), married men were called "brown-baggers", supposedly originating
from the brown-bag lunches they would bring in to work, because they were
not allowed to subsist in the general mess (they drew "commuted
rations"...payments in lieu of rations in kind).  This originated at shore
stations, because aboard ship all enlisted personnel subsist in the general
mess, but the term spread service-wide to refer to married men.

Bill P
On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 7:49 PM, victor steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       victor steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      brown-bagging
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> OED entries for "brown-bag" (n. and v.), "brown-bagging" (n. and adj.)
> and "brown-bagger" are somewhat limited. For one, there is a vast
> difference between brown-bagging booze and brown-bagging lunch. In
> fact, "brown-bag lunch" has acquired a fairly recent association with
> lunch-time seminars. One interesting aspect is that conference
> "brown-bag lunches" often have a distinction with school brown-bag
> lunches in that the former is supplied to the participants by the
> organizers (sometimes free, sometimes buy-in).
>
> Whatever the case, today we get an interesting report (well,
> technically, not today) that draws a new parallel between brown-bagged
> booze and brown-bag lunches:
>
> http://goo.gl/9Ptsi
> > Chicago School Bans Students Packing Lunch to 'Protect' Against
> Unhealthful Food Choices
> >
> > I would have bet anything that the story below would come out of San
> Francisco, but I would have been incorrect. Via The Faculty Lounge, I see
> that at least one public school in Chicago has decided that parents are so
> lousy at packing nutritious lunches for their kids that it has made eating
> the food served in the school cafeteria mandatory. That is to say, even if
> you want to bring a brown-bag lunch, you are not allowed to do so.
> > According to the Chicago Tribune, Elsa Carmona, principal of Little
> Village Academy, says the policy is intended to protect students from their
> own unhealthful food choices. Carmona created the policy six years ago after
> watching students drink soda and eat chips for lunch. Lunch policies in
> Chicago public schools are reportedly left to the judgment of each school
> principal.
>
> VS-)
>
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