_Mezzrow_(?), "marijuana cigarette"

[Laurence Horn]

>From some websites, it appears that "meserole" is another variant spelling.  Any connection to Meserole Avenue in Brooklyn?

LH

On Feb 22, 2012, at 7:25 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

> Now I see the prob.
>
> HDAS has _mezzroll_ (1944 - ) but not _mezzrow_. For some reason the ety.
> from Mezz Mezzrow's name is omitted.
>
> I had not heard the 1938 recording in 1997, and if I had, it's just as
> possible that I'd have heard the wrong form.
>
> JL
>
> On Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 4:53 PM, Ben Zimmer
> <bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu>wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
>> Subject:      Re: _Mezzrow_(?), "marijuana cigarette"
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> On Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 4:30 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>>>
>>> The song, Weed, recorded by Bea Foote and released in 1938, has the line,
>>>
>>> "All vipers love their _mezzrow_"
>> [...]
>>> WRT to dialect, she's r-full and pronounces "weed, need" as "wee-id,
>>> nee-id." In my *extremely* limited experience - a single speaker -
>>> this kind of breaking is characteristic of the BE of Virginia.
>>
>> Good ear, Wilson. According to Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of
>> Musicians, Bea was the brother of George Jenkins, drummer for Lionel
>> Hampton in the '40s, who was born in Norfolk, Va. in 1917.
>>
>> http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3491806197.html
>>
>> --bgz
>>
>> --
>> Ben Zimmer
>> http://benzimmer.com/
>>
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>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
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