[Ads-l] Antedating "Off the Cuff" - 1926, different meaning?

[MULLINS, WILLIAM D (Bill) CIV USARMY RDECOM AMRDEC (US)]

> 
> I've found an earlier example of "off the cuff" that appears unrelated to the Hollywood usage and which appears to mean something
> different from the spontaneous meaning of "off the cuff," but which may still be related to writing on cuffs.  The earliest example I found of
> this usage is 1926, and I could not quickly find any other such usages until the 1940s.
> 
> 
> "Living 'off the cuff'" was apparently used to refer to who live off borrow money or panhandlers, it's not quite clear which.  In the 1940s, it
> was used to refer to running a household on credit instead on a cash basis, and in the 1950s, it was used in a cartoon that showed someone
> approaching a pawn shop.  In these cases, it seems possible that it refers to keeping track of loans with notes on a shirt cuff, but it is not
> explained and I could not find very many examples to clarify.
> 

These quotes seems to support the idea that cuffs are where debts are recorded.

Cleveland OH _Plain Dealer_ 14 Feb 1925 p 15 col 7
"The French deputies who want us to scratch their war debt off the cuff better take notice that this one more battlefield the U.S.A. is furnishing."

_San Diego Union_ 29 Mar 1925 sec 3 p 10 col 2
"But as Bill was speaking in terms of cash and Ballston deals strictly off the cuff nothing changed hands except conversation."

Note that both of these quotes came from columns in the sports sections/pages.

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