[Ads-l] Bat Masterson Quote

ADSGarson O'Toole adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM
Sat Feb 18 20:03:28 UTC 2017


Same basic joke told in 1898:
The Pittsburgh Press
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Wednesday, February 2, 1898 - Page 4

On Sat, Feb 18, 2017 at 2:58 PM, ADSGarson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
> Quick response: The ice anecdote was in circulation by 1941. That is
> still a late date:
> The Age
> Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
> Saturday, March 8, 1941 - Page 9
>
> On Sat, Feb 18, 2017 at 2:13 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu> wrote:
>> There is a great quotation attributed to outlaw-turned-lawman "Bat" Masterson:  "There are many in this old world of ours who hold that things break even for all of us.  I have observed, for example, that we all get the same amount of ice.  The rich get it in the summertime, and the poor get it in the winter."  When I search ProQuest Historical Newspapers, I find articles from the early 1960s claiming that this was found on Masterson's typewriter when he died at his desk in 1921 (he was a newspaperman at that point in his life).
>>
>>
>> Can anyone supply any information about the veracity of this story?  Does it appear in print before the 1960s, and, if so, how far back can it be found?
>>
>>
>> Fred Shapiro
>>
>> ________________________________
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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