[Ads-l] what's the latest [,] dope/poop/skinny?

[Jonathan Lighter]

1877 Homer Lee _Fag-Ends from the Naval Academy_  [N.Y.: Homer Lee, 1877]
32:  Just bone up on your "Skinny" and let the youngsters be.

1894 _Lucky Bag_ [USNA] I 68: Skinny. Physics and chemistry.

Etc.

1991 Merrill L., Bartlett _Lejeune: A Marine's Life_ [Columbia: U. of S.C.
Press] 28 : Chemistry and physics [were] called "skinny" after the
legendary and popular professor. Paul J. Dashiell.

A search at HathiTrust shows that Dashiell was still an undergraduate at
St. John's College, Annapolis, in 1880, so he couldn't have inspired the
word "skinny" at the Academy in the 1870s.

As "facts or news," it's very rare in print until the 1960s or '70s, often
as "the straight skinny" or, rarely, "skinnay,"

Earliest: 1938.

JL

On Fri, Aug 30, 2019 at 8:47 AM Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu> wrote:

> These three can all sometimes mean, more or less, information.
> Though "red mike" apparently became specialized slang in the Naval
> Academy, the following might could be a case of USNA slang influencing a
> later (broadening?) development.
>
> The 1940 Lucky Bag yearbook uses "skinny" five times.
>
> https://archive.org/details/luckybag1940unse<
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__archive.org_details_luckybag1940unse&d=DwMFAg&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=qwwcnEh0SDhYkAO4qMBwW4xEtiaPWhXfdFqgH4eOSPY&s=hY4Vm5TQcZdx81ot3kJxhw4s2Byuj49C8crkmJb1TDU&e=
> >
>
> The mid-right photo caption is about solving a skinny problem, at a desk,
> in a classroom, with a slide rule in his pocket..
>
> https://archive.org/details/luckybag1940unse<
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__archive.org_details_luckybag1940unse&d=DwMFAg&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=qwwcnEh0SDhYkAO4qMBwW4xEtiaPWhXfdFqgH4eOSPY&s=hY4Vm5TQcZdx81ot3kJxhw4s2Byuj49C8crkmJb1TDU&e=
> >
>
> The Wm. Game text has skinny as an academic department.
>
> https://archive.org/details/luckybag1940unse<
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__archive.org_details_luckybag1940unse&d=DwMFAg&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=qwwcnEh0SDhYkAO4qMBwW4xEtiaPWhXfdFqgH4eOSPY&s=hY4Vm5TQcZdx81ot3kJxhw4s2Byuj49C8crkmJb1TDU&e=
> >
>
> "skinny kept him from athletics," apparently meaning low grades prevented
> him from participating in (varsity?) athletics.
>
> https://archive.org/details/luckybag1940unse<
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__archive.org_details_luckybag1940unse&d=DwMFAg&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=qwwcnEh0SDhYkAO4qMBwW4xEtiaPWhXfdFqgH4eOSPY&s=hY4Vm5TQcZdx81ot3kJxhw4s2Byuj49C8crkmJb1TDU&e=
> >
>
> His math and skinny were a breeze because of earlier college courses, in
> contrast to other academic (humanities, bull and dago) departments.
>
> https://archive.org/details/luckybag1940unse<
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__archive.org_details_luckybag1940unse&d=DwMFAg&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=qwwcnEh0SDhYkAO4qMBwW4xEtiaPWhXfdFqgH4eOSPY&s=hY4Vm5TQcZdx81ot3kJxhw4s2Byuj49C8crkmJb1TDU&e=
> >
>
> The hop (dance) was the end of math and skinny--so a change of pace.
>
>
> "Skinny" here may mean hard sciences (Physics et sim).
>
>
> Stephen Goranson
>
> http://people.duke.edu/~goranson/
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


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