"offshore" as preposition?

Mon May 20 16:51:29 UTC 2013

Date: June 18, 1942
Newspaper: State Times (State Times Advocate)
Article title: Lt. Robt. Taylor Hurt in Bombing Of Midway Island
Page: 1
Column: 3
Newspaper location: Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Database: GenealogyBank

[Begin excerpt]
Lt. (j. g.) Robert Connel Tay-
lor son of Mr. and Mrs. D. H.
Taylor of this city, is recuperat-
ing at the naval hospital at Pearl
Harbor from wounds received dur-
ing the bombing of Midway pre-
ceding the great air-naval battle
offshore the island, a letter re-
ceived by his parents today dis-
closed.
[End excerpt]

Garson

On Mon, May 20, 2013 at 4:20 AM, Ben Zimmer
<bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "offshore" as preposition?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Mon, May 20, 2013 at 3:44 AM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
>>
>> On Mon, May 20, 2013 at 1:34 AM, Pat O'Conner wrote:
>>>
>>> My husband (Stewart Kellerman) and I wrote a post about the
>>> prepositional use of "offshore" May 9  for our blog, Grammarphobia.com.
>>> It notes that according to the OED and M-W Collegiate, the prepositional
>>> use is fairly recent, dating from the mid-1960's.
>>> Link: http://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2013/05/offshore-of.html
>>
>> A bit earlier...
>>
>> 1961 Leon Wolff _Little Brown Brother_ 39 What with Dewey in the
>> Orient grimly preparing for war, and the _Maine_ resting at anchor
>> offshore Havana, one might assume that things had gone from bad to
>> worse.
>>
>> 1961 _Ibid._ 57 The Spanish fleet was not sighted offshore Manila, and
>> the Americans turned westward toward Cavite.
>>
>> 1961 _Ibid._ 106 For eight endless days, unable to debark, his
>> expedition sat offshore the Tambo beach.
>>
>> http://books.google.com/books?id=hHzvx94oiUgC
>
> Snippet view, but it seems to check out:
>
> 1955 _Gas Age_ 29 Dec. 37 The Offshore Gathering Corporation, with
> headquarters in Houston, Texas, announced through its President, Mr.
> David C. Bintliff, that the company has filed an application with the
> FPC for a certificate of necessity to build a submarine gas pipe line
> offshore the Coast of Louisiana from the Sabine River to the coast of
> the state of Mississippi.
>
> http://books.google.com/books?id=K-NQAAAAYAAJ
>
> --bgz
>
> --
> Ben Zimmer
> http://benzimmer.com/
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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