"gandy dancer" antedated to 1915

[Eric Nielsen]

Utah Phillips speaks of gandy-dancing in his story of  "Moose Turd Pie".

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zb1qsVqjwg

Eric




On Sun, Jul 8, 2012 at 2:06 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "gandy dancer" antedated to 1915
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Sun, Jul 8, 2012 at 11:02 AM, Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu>
> wrote:
> > A railroad maintenance-worker or section-hand.
>
> I know _gandy(-)dancer_, FWIW, as a name for a "*railroad-track*
> maintenance-worker" and not as a name for any random railroad
> maintenance-worker.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandy_dancer
>
> This comment is aimed at the OED definition and not at Stephen's
> antedating. It's hardly unknown for non-standard terms to have
> different-strokes-for-different-folks meanings.
>
>
> http://books.google.com/books?id=kNk4AAAAMAAJ&q=%22gandy+dancer%22&dq=%22gandy+dancer%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=TMb5T9fQHarl0QGB_NX3Bg&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAA
>
> is a ref to (blocked) AS 1930.
> --
> -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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