[Ads-l] Granddog/grandog

[Benjamin Barrett]

Today, I saw a car with two bumperstickers:

I love my dog
I love my grandogs

Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/granddog) has this, listing 
it as humorous and the single-d version 
(https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/grandog) as a misspelling. I suspect the 
humorous label may not always apply anymore due to the shift of 
incorporating pets into the family.

Neither the Oxford Dictionary nor the Merriam-Webster websites include 
the word.

Google Books (http://bit.ly/1zSXc7o) has "Since Heck's great granddog | 
Was a pup - " from 1935, but that citation cannot be seen. It seems 
possible that Heck is a dog, in which case this is also irrelevant ("In 
names of family relationships" as per the Oxford site).

On the previous page of hits is the following evidently from 1955 (James 
Thurber, "Thurber's Dog's: A Collection of the Master's Dogs"):
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fifteen years old, and since she was given to my daughter when my 
daughter was nine, and since my daughter now has a daughter of her own, 
this makes old Christabel, I suppose, what might be called a granddog.
-----

The next chronological hits on Google Books jump to 1978 and 1980. The 
word comes up a number of times in the 1990s and takes off in the aughts.

I looked at about half of the GB hit pages for "grand-dog" as well, 
which covers both hyphenated and open ("grand dog") forms. Most of those 
I dismissed as being "grand" as in "great." Nothing beat the 1995 
citation for the Wiktionary meaning, though there was a 1975 hit 
(http://bit.ly/1vUwsHb) that might be relevant:
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Saying the pup was worthless and had no place in a house where bread was 
hard earned, Davie Campbell's father forbade him to keep the wee grand 
dog bought with his savings and named Joseph because of its rainbow-hued
----

Benjamin Barrett
Formerly of Seattle, WA

Learn Ainu!
https://sites.google.com/site/aynuitak1/home

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