honcho v.

[Jonathan Lighter]

"Honcho," v.  is in HDAS from 1955, with exx. ref. to the Korean War.

Not only pilots were stationed in Japan. There were thousands of army troops
as well - not to mention nonflying USAF personnel who inevitably made up the
vast majority.

The noun at least (correctly transliterated as {hancho}) almost certainly
appeared in English-Japanese pidgin before the occupation of Japan. Some
autobiographical accounts of U.S. PWs held by the Japanese include it.

It's postwar career in the civilian lexicon, however, seems not to have been
very noticeable till the '60s.

JL


On Tue, Oct 4, 2011 at 4:45 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: honcho v.
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> In fact, the third OED quotation has a verb, not a noun:
>
> > 1964 Sat. Rev. (U.S.) 10 Oct. 82/2   Jack Bullock, who honchoes the
> > Curaçao casino.
>
>     VS-)
>
> On 10/4/2011 4:43 AM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
> > I was curious about the origin of "honcho", and we were just
> > discussing this on list. The first OED reference is to a 1947 book,
> > which matches the idea of it being brought over by pilots who were
> > stationed in Japan after WWII (and all through the Korean War). But
> > it's the second citation that's interesting.
> >
> >> 1955 Amer. Speech 30 118 Honcho. 1. n. A man in charge. (This is a
> >> Japanese word translated roughly as 'Chief officer', brought back
> >> from Japan by fliers stationed there during the occupation and during
> >> the Korean fighting.‥) 2. v. To direct a detail or operation.
> >
> > MWOLD also lists the same origin, but gives 1955 as the date of
> > impact. This would have been ho-hum, but for the part that follows 2.:
> > "v." There is no "honcho v." in the OED. But there should be. Even if
> > there was little evidence of it in 1955, there is plenty of evidence
> > now--GB find 400+ raw ghits for "honchoed" alone (well, including
> > "honchoing" and a few strays). Most are recent vintage and appear to
> > be perfectly legit. Restricting the dates, leaves 8 hits prior to
> > 1970, with four that appear legitimate, all in military context. (None
> > have been verified, but the dates are secondary, at the moment.)
> >
> >> The Leatherneck: Volume 50
> >> 1967 - Snippet view
> >> ... crewing one of the Marine boats, LtCol Randolph and Maj Colleton
> >> also honcho-ed much of the advance planning and final execution of
> >> Frostbite, which appears simple enough on paper, but actually is an
> >> annual aspirin-consuming task. ...
> >
> >> Small unit action in Vietnam, summer 1966
> >> Francis J. West, United States. Marine Corps - 1967 - 123 pages -
> >> Snippet view
> >> On 8 May, the lst Platoon of Delta Company was 52 men strong,
> >> commanded by a first lieutenant and honchoed* by a staff sergeant.
> >> For a month they patrolled. At division level, the operations section
> >> could see ...
> >
> >> Army: Volume 16
> >> Association of the United States Army - 1966 - Snippet view
> >> Neither should he be running a movie projector, nor honchoing a
> >> bowling alley, nor selling tickets, nor checking people in and out of
> >> the post exchange, nor tending a counter in a QM clothing store, nor
> >> walking post. ...
> >
> >> The Leatherneck: Volume 49
> >> Leatherneck Association - 1966 - Snippet view
> >> ... honchoed ...
> >
> > Both Leathernecks may be errors--clicking the link gives no record of
> > "honchoed" inside the volume. West's book gives a clear snippet (looks
> > typewritten, which seems appropriate) with "honchoed" followed by an
> > asterisk, which, I presume, gives a footnote explanation. The Army
> > also gives nothing (which, of course, does not necessarily mean it's
> > not there). Still, there is one clear hit from the period.
> >
> > So there appears to be no reason /not/ to have a honcho v. article.
> > OUP does recognize it--on-line World Dictionary lists the verb. So
> > does AHD4 and Webster's New World College, Collins, InfoPlease and
> > Random House Unabridged. So it's really the OED and MWOLD that are
> > behind.
> >
> > Wiktionary, FarLex and Dictionary.com (WordNet 3.0) also list "head
> > honcho" as idiomatic. OED, AHD4 and MWOLD make no mention of it,
> > although it shows up in quotations they all use.
> >
> > VS-)
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
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