Strac[k]

[Wilson Gray]

On Fri, Dec 23, 2011 at 5:17 PM, Douglas G. Wilson <douglas at nb.net> wrote:
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> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: Strac[k]
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>
> This was discussed here a few years ago too.
>
> http://tinyurl.com/82b7xdv
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

You must be older than I am, Dave. Nearly a dozen years ago hardly
strikes me as merely "a few" of them. That post pretty much obviates
the need for for any of the info in my post, except for the fact that
a particular kind of equipment was also routinely referred to as
"STRAC," after it was issued to the troops in Germany, beginning, IME,
in 1961.

Sigh! I would love to have posted,

"As Dave Wilton has already pointed out, nearly a dozen years ago …"
Now, I'll never have that honor. :-(

I go with _STRAC_ because, until now, the upper-case spelling was the
only one that I'd ever seen used.

At the time, the handing out of the "STRAC" equipment was thought to
mean that *all* (combat, at least) units were going to be made STRAC.
That is, the new stuff was called "STRAC" because people thought that
it was the first step in the STRAC-ification of the entire Army.
--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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