swabbie, swabbo

[Douglas G. Wilson]

On 9/12/2014 2:32 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      swabbie, swabbo
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I "swabbie"
>
> Not in OED, though HDAS files have loads of cites from WW2 on.
>
> It means a sailor, esp. a deckhand. A swabber of decks.
>
> Here's an interesting adumbration:
>
> 1911 Arthur Train, in _Evening Star_ (Wash., D.C.) (Apr. 11) (Sunday Mag.)
> 16: Why, it's old Swabbie the scrubwoman! Hello, Swabbie, old girl!
>
> Train was a popular novelist of the day, and his story ("Bat") appeared in
> several papers.
>
> II  "swabbo"
>
> Also not in OED. Occasionally a synonym for the above (as in Tom Wolfe),
> but in older naval usage a zero or, as below, a complete miss on a target
> range.
>
> 1909 _Boston Journal_ (July 30) 6:The scorers were all men of the United
> States Marine Corps, and when a shooter fired at a target and got a miss,
> and the red flag was waved to denote the fact, the scorer called out in the
> language of the service: "A swabbo for -------."  Much merriment ensued,
> and the [Spanish-American War veterans] now have a new word added to their
> vocabulary.
--

This "swabbo" is new to me AFAIK.

Cf. "swab-O sign": I understand this to refer to an "OK"/"good" gesture 
with the index finger and the thumb forming a circle, but I can't 
remember where I got this idea.

Quick Google shows me three instances of this term referring to some 
kind of gesture, all three compatible with a hand gesture with the sense 
"OK", all in fictional works by Poul Anderson. Since I spent a portion 
of my youth reading material by this author, it might could be that I 
got it from him.

Maybe the shape of the sign suggests "zero" ("O").

-- Doug Wilson

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