[Ads-l] Antedating busboy (bus boy) and "omnibus boy"

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Wed Jul 12 16:37:00 UTC 2017


> WB:  Here's how I look at it.  (*vehiculum) omnibus > bus (public
> transportation for all social classes).
> Bus boy (restaurant factotum).

Nobody's ever explained it to me that way, before. WB's incisive mind has
pierced to the heart of the matter.

On Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 3:36 AM, W Brewer <brewerwa at gmail.com> wrote:

> WG:  << So, _bus_ is from "omnibus" and _bus boy_ is from "omnibus boy,"
> because
> both are "for everybody." >>
>
> WB:  Here's how I look at it.  (*vehiculum) omnibus > bus (public
> transportation for all social classes).
> Bus boy (restaurant factotum).
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
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