[Ads-l] Joke: "How Many People Work Here?" "About Half of Them"

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

The QI article has now been updated with the “Fliegende Blätter”
citation. There is usually a delay while the new information
propagates through the distributed system.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2020/08/27/how-many/

[Begin addition to acknowledgement]
Many thanks to Joe Stynes, Daniel Rentzsch, and Peter Reitan who
searched for the German version of the joke based on the
acknowledgement information provided in “Transatlantic Tales”. The
search concluded successfully. Also thanks to Dan Goncharoff and Joe
Stynes for estimating the publication date in “Fliegende Blätter”.
[End addition to acknowledgement]

Your help is greatly appreciated
Garson O'Toole


On Thu, Aug 27, 2020 at 10:03 PM ADSGarson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dan Goncharoff wrote:
> > The best I can do with the date is to say that issue 3213 was published for
> > the 8th week of 1907.
> >
> > https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/fb
>
> That makes sense, Dan.
> January 1, 1907 was a Tuesday. Presumably  "Fliegende Blätter" was
> published on the same day each week, but I do not know which day.
> For simplicity, assume publication day was Tuesday. The first eight
> weeks would look like this:
>
> Issue 3206 Jan 01 to Jan 07 in 1907
> Issue 3207 Jan 08 to Jan 14 in 1907
> Issue 3208 Jan 15 to Jan 21 in 1907
> Issue 3209 Jan 22 to Jan 28 in 1907
> Issue 3210 Jan 29 to Feb 04 in 1907
> Issue 3211 Feb 05 to Feb 11 in 1907
> Issue 3212 Feb 12 to Feb 18 in 1907
> Issue 3213 Feb 19 to Feb 25 in 1907
>
> Garson
>
> > On Thu, Aug 27, 2020, 7:55 PM ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Joe Stynes sent me a great tweet with a link to the page in "Fliegende
> > > Blätter" containing the joke. But there is no date. Can someone figure
> > > out the date? The quotation is on page 92  and the issue cover seems
> > > to occur on page 85.
> > >
> > > https://twitter.com/joestynes/status/1299102638953426947?s=20
> > >
> > > [Begin excerpt]
> > > FB v.126 no.3213 p.92 «Mißverstanden»
> > > „Wieviel Leute sind denn bei Euch im Bureau tätig?"
> > > „Tätig? Na — zwei Drittel!"
> > > https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/fb126/0098/image
> > > [End excerpt]
> > >
> > > Garson

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