[Ads-l] down to a dull roar

[Jonathan Lighter]

Wilson's memory is unimpeachable:

1951 Maxwell Griffith _Port of Call_ (Phila.: Lippincott) 28: Let's hold it
down to a dull roar in there.

JL

On Tue, Oct 31, 2017 at 1:41 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:

> My high-school Latin teacher used the expression, "Let's keep it down to a
> dull roar." This was 1950-52. We had the same teacher for two years, the
> guy from Omaha who complained that St. Louisans had a strange accent,
> saying, e.g. "Far-est Pork" instead of "Fore-est Park.".
>
> On Mon, Oct 30, 2017 at 5:55 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > I think I first noticed this cliche' in the late '60s.
> >
> > Almost literal:
> >
> > 1959 _Cleveland Plain Dealer_ (Sept. 9) 16: Three others - Pan American,
> > BOAC, and Aerolineas Argentinas - have been officially complimented for
> > keeping noise down to a dull roar.
> >
> > Figurative:
> >
> > 1961 _Times-Picayune_ (N.O.) (June 9) 33: "Life will never be the same
> > again," [Cmdr. Alan B. Shepard,Jr.] said. "I imagine one day that things
> > will die down to a dull roar.
> >
> > 2017 _The Young & the Restless_ (CBS-TV) (Oct. 30): Let's keep it down
> to a
> > dull roar.
> >
> > JL
> > --
> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> truth."
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > 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
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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