[Ads-l] Further Antedating of "Preppy"

[Jonathan Lighter]

HDAS assigns the 1900 date as well.

JL

On Sat, Oct 26, 2019 at 8:58 PM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> >  Does this analysis make sense?
>
> Yes. In fact, I thought of something like it myself but wasn't able to ID
> the two sub-senses through a quick look at Google Books.
>
> JL
>
> On Sat, Oct 26, 2019 at 7:02 PM Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> > On Oct 26, 2019, at 9:20 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> wrote:
>> >
>> > True, true.
>> >
>> > But with billions and zillions of printed words available, many of them
>> > written by former preppies, how is it that the word has been
>> statistically
>> > almost nonexistent for most of its lifetime?
>> >
>> > Beats me.
>> >
>> > JL
>>
>> That's both undeniable and inexplicable, I admit. Indeed, I recall that,
>> During The War, there was even a prep-school comic-book hero - *not* Frank
>> Merriwell - whose name has been on the tip of my tongue since this thread
>> began. Like Frank, this guy had no superpowers. He was just twice as good
>> as anybody else.
>>
>> Dick Cole! He was a cadet at the Farr Military Academy, not, strictly
>> speaking, a prep school, but close enough for government work.
>> http://www.toonopedia.com/dickcole.htm
>>
>> BTW, thanks to Yalie Frank Merriwell, "Boola Boola" was one of my favorite
>> tunes. On the radio program, Frank's dad always sang the song as he drove
>> the fam to the Harvard-Yale game.
>>
>> Candidate for POTY:
>> > Maybe it was existent all those years—but inChoate.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Oct 26, 2019 at 9:21 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > True, true.
>> >
>> > But with billions and zillions of printed words available, many of them
>> > written by former preppies, how is it that the word has been
>> statistically
>> > almost nonexistent for most of its lifetime?
>> >
>> > Beats me.
>> >
>> > JL
>> >
>> > On Fri, Oct 25, 2019 at 11:35 PM Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > > > "Preppy" doesn't even have the excuse of having being thought
>> coarse or
>> > > > unprintable.
>> > >
>> > > True, but it's also not a word that would have fallen trippingly from
>> the
>> > > tongues of the lower orders. I thought that _Choate_ was pronounced
>> > > "Cho-ate," until I became a buddy of a Yalie who was a Choate grad
>> while
>> > I
>> > > was serving in the Army Security Agency. Even when the preppy style of
>> > > dress became popular among the plebs, it was known as "Ivy League" and
>> > not
>> > > as "preppy."
>> > >
>> > > On Fri, Oct 25, 2019 at 5:03 PM Jonathan Lighter <
>> wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com
>> > >
>> > > wrote:
>> > >
>> > > > Maybe I've said this before, but what is most interesting in such
>> cases
>> > > is
>> > > > not the remarkable age of the term, but the fact that decades (in
>> this
>> > > > case, many decades) evidently had to elapse before it entered common
>> > > > currency.
>> > > >
>> > > > "Preppy" doesn't even have the excuse of having being thought
>> coarse or
>> > > > unprintable.
>> > > >
>> > > > JL
>> > > >
>> > > > On Fri, Oct 25, 2019 at 2:31 PM Shapiro, Fred <
>> fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
>> > > > wrote:
>> > > >
>> > > > > I have previously antedated the noun "preppy" (formerly having a
>> 1956
>> > > > > first use citation in the OED) back to 1928.  Here is a much
>> earlier
>> > > > cite:
>> > > > >
>> > > > >
>> > > > > preppy, n. (OED 1928)
>> > > > >
>> > > > > 1880 _Occident_ (Colorado College newspaper) 1 Apr. 17/1
>> (Elephind)
>> > > Now
>> > > > > the thirsty preppie goes to the hydrant, faint and far; he drinks
>> > > > directly
>> > > > > from its notes, or takes a Leyden-jar.
>> > > > >
>> > > > > Fred Shapiro
>> > > > >
>> > > > >
>> > > > >
>> > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > > > > 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
>> > > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > --
>> > > -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
>> >
>>
>>
>> --
>> -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."
>


-- 
"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