[Ads-l] Origin of Pittsburgh Pirates nickname

Peter Reitan pjreitan at HOTMAIL.COM
Mon Oct 15 20:24:01 UTC 2018


I recently posted an article about the origin of the Pittsburgh Pirates' nickname.  The general story is well known - Pittsburgh "stole" (allegedly - they were exonerated) some players - therefore "Pirates."  The story is a bit more complex than that; there were a lot of pirates and accusations of piracy flying around at the time.  Humorously, when the name Pirates finally caught on with Pittsburgh, it was borrowed from lyrics from the Pirates of Penzance, "It is, it is, a glorious thing, to be, to be a Pirate King."

https://esnpc.blogspot.com/2018/10/the-pittsburgh-pirates-of-penzance.html


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



More information about the Ads-l mailing list