Further Antedating of "Billionaire"

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Tue Sep 4 23:36:44 UTC 2012


On Sep 4, 2012, at 7:17 PM, Shapiro, Fred wrote:

> billionaire (OED 1861)
>
> 1844 _Knickerbocker_ Mar. 288 (American Periodicals Series)  A 'millionaire;' or, for that matter, a 'billionaire,' if we had him, would not hesitate to take out of his mouth a moiety of his last 'chew' and give it to an itinerant Lazarus.
>
Ah, those bad old days before Ayn Rand came along and showed those wishy-washy {m/b}illionaires how to put the itinerant Lazaruses in their place:  No free chew for you!

LH

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