Heard on The judges: "Ripping and running"

Sat Apr 30 15:35:28 UTC 2011

Great sleuthing, Victor.

JL

On Sat, Apr 30, 2011 at 9:51 AM, 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:      Re: Heard on The judges: "Ripping and running"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I might have found a 1906 hit, but, first things first.
>
> Taking it in another direction, there are quite a few /recent/ hits for
> "rip-and-run" with a number of different meanings. I got over 500 raw GB
> hits just on direct search pattern--didn't even try any variations yet and
> haven't had a chance to look through the entire collection (probably will
> come down to a couple of hundred /actual/ hits). The impression so far is
> that the expression is actually quite diverse. There is a "rip-and-run"
> football play that's mentioned /at least/ since 1991. But there are several
> other uses in reference to particular actions and types of behavior,
> including "wild" spending, children running around, theft (e.g., lifting
> ca=
> r
> stereos--literally ripping them out and running away), construction
> day-jobs, etc. So there are both verbal "rip and run" and adjectival
> "rip-and-run".
>
> A couple that may be worth noting.
>
> http://goo.gl/kq2hP
> The Granta book of the American long story. Ed. by Richard Ford. London:
> 1998
> A Long Day in November. By Ernest J. Gaines. p. 261 [Full text preview.
> Reprinted in another collection in 2006--First shows up in Texas Quarterly,
> 1964, then in Langston Hughes, The Best Short Stories by Black Writers,
> 196=
> 7
> and Gaines's own collection in 1968]
> > You ain't satisfied 'less he got you doing all the work while he rip and
> run up and down the road with his other nigger friends. No, you ain't
> satisfied.
> p,. 263
> > 'You just take one more step toward my door,' Fran'mon says, 'and it'll
> take a' undertaker to get you out of here. So help me, God, I'll get that
> butcher knife out of that kitchen and chop on your tail till I can't see
> tail to chop on. You the kind of nigger like to rip and run up and down the
> road in your car long 's you got a dime, but when you get broke and you
> belly get empty you run to your wife and cry on her shoulder. ...'
>
> http://goo.gl/hQ7Rf
> Black Enterprise. Vol. 20:10. May 1990
> Personal Finance Profiles. Where Are They Now. By Lloyd Gite.
> George and Lisbeth Crawford. p. 62/1
> > "On weekends we used to rip and run all the time. We'd go to dinner,
> parties and to the movies. Now we find ourselves centering our attention on
> our kids.
> p. 64/1
> > Last year the Crawfords say they spent $3,000 on diapers and baby food,
> and $8,000 for a babysitter. Although the Crawfords can't afford to "rip
> an=
> d
> run" like they used to, shrewd financial planning has enabled them to
> continue to enjoy the good life.
>
> http://goo.gl/eRgxi
> Fire in my Bones: Transcendence and the Holy Spirit in African American
> Gospel. By Glenn Hinson. 2000
> Chapter 16. "We Didn't Come for No Form or Fashion". p. 248
> > As a singer, he had convinced himself that the only way to move a crowd
> was to "rip and run." Such "outside show" always got the shouts and grabbed
> the acclaim.
>
> http://goo.gl/04bS0
> Mother Jones Magazine. Vol. 1:5. July 1976
> Sports Books: The Best of All Seasons. By Ropert Lipsyte. p. 60
> > After 14 1/2 years in the prison of my fat--I started that July at 211
> pounds--I was finally ready to rip and run. That summer of my liberation I
> lost 46 pounds and read /Farewell to Sport/ three times, some parts five or
> six, lying in bed exhausted after a day of mowing lawns.
>
> http://goo.gl/zUmMR [Snippet not visible, text from preview.]
> http://goo.gl/d3nWg [Full snippet visible, but volume/date/page not
> verified.]
> American Magazine. 1952
> p. 124/3
> > When we stopped in the late afternoon for the night =97 stopping early to
> give the children an hour or two in which to rip and run--we discovered
> tha=
> t
> not only had we covered our mileage quota without racing, but that we had
> had a lot of fun and still loved one another dearly.
>
>
> Cold Steel. By Matthew Phipps Shiel. 1929
> > The women sat still, three with babies at the breast, waiting that the
> boat should rip and run, and the trip be done; Bessie's forehead was
> proppe=
> d
> on her palm astarboard; and she was so undone ...
>
> Again, I am not trying to be systematic or exhaustive here--merely picking
> out a sample. Note that the last one (1929) does not appear in the same
> meaning as the rest--it's the only non-spurious hit before 1950. But,
> following up on Garson's variants, I also tried "rip-an'-run" and got two
> hits.
>
> http://goo.gl/YziRm [Snippet not visible, text from preview only.]
> The wonderful weald and the quest of the crock of gold. By Arthur Beckett.
> 1924
> > So off dey goos over de fields wid de mare's-egg ; and prensly him what
> was a-carryin' of it ketches his foot in a hole in de groun' so dat he
> dropped de pumpkin all of a sudden, an' starts a hare from de bushes so dat
> it rip-an-run ...
>
>
> http://goo.gl/fS62V
> Sprigs o' Mint. By James Tandy Ellis. 1906
> Bill Boles, Of the Steamboat Band. p. 86
> > Hist legs they were bowed, jes' as if they's made
> > Fer that fiddle to set between.
> > His hands they was big as a post-hole spade,
> > An' I reckon about as clean.
> > But when he strung fer a rip an' run,
> > His face a-smile like the risin' sun,
> > He looked right well--the son of a gun,--
> > At least, thar air worse I have seen.
>
> The last one certainly seems authentic--Harvard Library stamp is from 1940
> on the 1906 copyright page and the same date appears on the title page,
> eve=
> n
> though the font looks a bit more modern than that. The book's title is in
> the header on every page, so it's not picked up from another source.
>
> VS-)
>
>
> On Sat, Apr 30, 2011 at 7:40 AM, Garson O'Toole
> <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:
>
> >
> > Great finds Wilson! Here is [Rippin' and Runnin'] used in the title of
> > a recording in Billboard magazine in 1952.
> >
> > Cite: 1952 June 28, Billboard, Rhythm & Blues Record Releases, Page
> > 37, Column 2, Nielsen Business Media, Inc.
> >
> > Rippin' and Runnin' - Tiny Bradshaw & Ork (Lay It) King 4547
> > http://books.google.com/books?id=3DAR4EAAAAMBAJ&q=3Drippin#v=3Dsnippet&
> >
> > In the prose domain the form [rippin' an' runnin'] probably appears in
> > the following 1958 novel.
> >
> > Cite: 1958, Let No Man Write My Epitaph by Willard Motley, GB Page
> > 155, Random House, New York. (Google Books snippet; Not verified on
> > paper; Data may be inaccurate; Duke catalog concurs with date of
> > publication)
> >
> > They're rippin' an' runnin' to try to get some money to satisfy that
> > Chinaman. That goddamn Chinaman's ridin' them so fast they ain't even
> > got time to talk to you.
> > http://books.google.com/books?id=3DPP1JAAAAMAAJ&q=3Drippin#search_anchor
> >
> > Here is a link to the Wikipedia entry for the author, Willard Motley:
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willard_Motley
> >
> > The book was made into a movie in 1960. Here is the IMDB link:
> > http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054021/
> >
> >
> > Here is a raw match in Google Books with a GB date of 1946. I cannot
> > generate a snippet showing the excerpt, so I do not know much about
> > it. The UNC catalog says volume 55 is dated 1946; vol. 56 is 1947;
> > vol. 57 is 1948. Date probes produce information consistent with the
> > time period.
> >
> > Coopers international journal: Volumes 55-57
> > Coopers International Union of North America - 1946 - Snippet view
> > No longer should we be set as individual workers after realizing what
> > it means to be an organized group. Lay offs, lost favors with the
> > company, are fruits of ripping and running on the job. A fair day's
> > work is expected and ...
> > http://books.google.com/books?id=3DKQh_AAAAMAAJ&
> >
> > The phrase used with a different meaning in 1909:
> > 1909, Spices and how to know them by Walter M. Gibbs
> >
> >
> http://books.google.com/books?id=3DhsUuAAAAYAAJ&q=3Dripping#v=3Dsnippet&q=
> =3Dripping&f=3Dfalse
> >
> >
>
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