frunk: front trunk of an automobile (Tesla electric car)

Tom Zurinskas truespel at HOTMAIL.COM
Fri May 16 03:41:43 UTC 2014


A few years ago, we decided to call eating between dinner and lunch as "dunch".  So when I had that VW Beetle sometimes we kept our dunch in the frunk.Who knew.

Tom Zurinskas, Conn 20 yrs, Tenn 3, NJ 33, now Fl 9.
See how English spelling links to sounds at http://justpaste.it/ayk


> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: frunk: front trunk of an automobile (Tesla electric car)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> The VW bugs used to have such front trunks (with engine in rear), but I don't recall anyone calling them frunks.   Maybe if you sit on one of these while you eat a hot dog, it becomes a frunkfurter.
> 
> LH
> 
> On May 14, 2014, at 4:45 PM, ADSGarson O'Toole wrote:
> 
> > The Tesla Model S electric car does not have a motor in the front. The
> > space beneath the front hood is called the "frunk". The first citation
> > below suggests that someone at Tesla coined (or popularized) the term.
> > I have not attempted to locate the earliest instance. A quick search
> > at Wordspy, Barry Popik's website, and the ADS mailing list archive
> > revealed no matches.
> >
> > Website:  FIVE THôT getthefive
> > Article: The Eye Candy
> > Author: David Allen Ibsen
> > Date: July 07, 2012
> > http://www.getthefive.com/articles/the-eye-candy/defining-the-frunk-tesla-names-the-front-trunk-in/
> >
> > [Begin excerpt]
> > The folks at Tesla also decided to define another aspect of the
> > car—the front boot (trunk). You see, the front section of the car—what
> > has been called the abandoned engine bay, creates a front trunk space,
> > or front-trunk which Tesla calls the "frunk."
> > [End excerpt]
> >
> >
> > Website: The Oatmeal
> > Comic title: What it's like to own a Tesla Model S: A cartoonist's
> > review of his magical space car
> > Author: The Oatmeal (Matthew Inman)
> > Date: Not listed
> > http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla_model_s
> >
> > [Begin excerpt]
> > If you pop the hood, there's nothing inside. No engine. No gurgling
> > tubes. No sputtering oil. It's just a big empty space known as the
> > "frunk" (front tunk)
> > [End excerpt]
> >
> > Garson
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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