"Clunker" not in OED?

[Joel S. Berson]

Oops!  But Sarah, how did you get to see the page?  All I can get is
a Snippet view!

Joel

At 2/19/2011 06:03 PM, Sarah wrote:
>On 2011-02-19, at 1:55 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: "Clunker" not in OED?
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Well, now on-list instead of just to Fred.  (And how could I ever
> > have overlooked "cash for clunkers"?)
> >
> > The following, alleged by GBooks/Snippet to be 1926 (English Journal,
> > vol. 15), is I suspect correctly dated (the English Journal
> > apparently started in 1912):
> >
> > "bluffer when he finds among the questions that general type to which
> > even the class Clunker may attempt a satisfactory reply; it begins
> > like this: "Describe the wreck of the "; "Name several
> > characteristics of "; or "Trace the general ... "
> >
> > This may be a person as the "thing that is worthless, inferior,
> > unsuccessful, etc." (the class dunce?).  But more context would help,
> > and why "Clunker" is capitalized I can't guess.
> >
>
>It actually says "class flunker" if you look at the scanned image of
>the book itself. (The "fl" ligature is mistaken for a "C.")
>
>S.
>
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