invariant "be"

[Wilson Gray]

On Tue, Jun 5, 2012 at 11:32 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> I suspect Wilson will soon tell us that "Bridewell" would not be in
> the vernacular of an African-American woman  in 1818.

Unless the woman quoted was *not* using "bridewell" as a synonym of
"penitentiary, prison" then I have every reason to expect that a black
woman self-identifying as a "habitual criminal," in current language,
would indeed have "bridewell" as a part of her active vocabulary at a
time in which it was part of the active vocabulary of the
constabulary.

FWIW, I learned "penitentiary" almost as soon as I learned to speak,
probably mere seconds after I learned "jail." If you stand on your
tiptoes, you can see Huntsville - y'all mimba Lamaah Hunt 'nim - the
location of the Texas State Penitentiary, from Marshall.

According to W:pedia,

"The prison's first inmates arrived on October 1, 1849. The
[Huntsville] unit was named after the City (if pop.1.5K is a "city")
of Huntsville. Originally, Huntsville Unit was for White Texans, only.
The only penalties available to Black Texans were whipping and
hanging."

<sigh!> Those were the good old days.

--
-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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