[Ads-l] Slight antedating of "banana republic" (May, 1901)

[Peter Reitan]

"Banana State," as applied to North Dakota in 1889, had a specific meaning that appears unrelated to later uses of "Banana Republic."  It was a joke based on the preexisting expression, "Banana Belt," which referred to a region with more moderate temperatures than might otherwise be expected.


In the early 1870s, Jay Cooke started building the Northern Pacific Railroad that was to run from Duluth, Minnesota to Seattle Washington, to bring goods from the Pacific to the trade routes of the Great Lakes, and vice versa.  Promotional material for the line and for development of the territory to be traversed by the line suggested that much of the territory was more temperate than would be expected for its northern latitudes.


Jay Cooke hired a man named Selucius Garfielde, who had served in Congress from the State of Washington, to promote the railroad's interests.  According to the Report of the Minnesota Railroad Commissioner published in 1883, looking back on the crazy ideas that accompanied the early planning stages of the railroad, Garfield is said to have "declared that the winds from the japan current would follow the building of the road and make a banana belt from Puget Sound to Lake Superior."


The earliest example of "banana belt" I was able to quickly find in Newspapers.com is from 1874, in a report of a cold snap in Idaho that killed 1,200 head of cattle near the Snake River.  There are frequent, ironic references to the "Banana Belt" throughout the next couple decades during unseasonably cold or warm periods in North Dakota.


The expression "Banana Belt" is apparently in current use as a legitimate meteorogical or geographical term. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_belt

The expression may have been coined by Garfielde in the early 1870s.


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From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Stephen Goranson <goranson at DUKE.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, February 25, 2018 4:31 AM
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Subject: Re: Slight antedating of "banana republic" (May, 1901)

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Subject:      Re: Slight antedating of "banana republic" (May, 1901)
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More than one South Dakota newspaper in 1889 suggested calling North Dakota=
 "the Banana state."

SG

https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn99067997/1889-11-29/ed-1/seq-2/#d=
ate1=3D1789&sort=3Ddate&date2=3D1949&searchType=3Dadvanced&language=3D&sequ=
ence=3D0&index=3D4&words=3DBanana+state&proxdistance=3D5&rows=3D20&ortext=
=3D&proxtext=3D&phrasetext=3Dbanana+state&andtext=3D&dateFilterType=3DyearR=
ange&page=3D1


________________________________
From: American Dialect Society <...> on behalf of Stephen Goranson <...>
Sent: Saturday, February 24, 2018 6:21 AM
To: ...
Subject: Re: [ADS-L] Slight antedating of "banana republic" (May, 1901)

Tenuous as the following may be:


1891, April 3

"The Italian Situation

The trouble with Italy shows no interesting developments. Grim-visaged War =
has not yet appeared before the floodlights, albeit the marquis of Rudina [=
Antonio Starabba], who appears to have charge of the rest of the banana sta=
tesmen [not a hapax; also attested in an 1895 Tacoma seaport story], is sup=
posed to be carrying on private rehearsals. The most significant thing in t=
he dispatches...is the prominence given to A. G. Porter [sic], the American=
 minister at Rome....."

Apparently, according to The Atlanta Constitution, Porter was dealing with =
several murders, assassinations or executions, including that of David Henn=
essy, a detective in New Orleans, who captured an Italian criminal, and was=
 later killed, allegedly as part of waterfront Mafia feuding.


Stephen Goranson




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