[Ads-l] "smart Alecs" 1864 antedating

[Mark Mandel]

Note below the expression "he could laugh in his sleeve", which today, and
for as long as I remember (ca. 1960), is and has been "laugh up his sleeve".

MAM

On Wed, Jan 1, 2020, 11:38 AM Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu> wrote:

> New York Clipper, Jan. 2, 1864, 300/4.
> Title: Frank Burns' "Oriental."
> It reportedly was a NYC "concert saloon," affected by NY State Albany
> lawmakers  from "rural districts," "abolishing waiter girls from our
> concert halls."
>
> <begin quote>
> Soon after the bursting up of the "upper houses" from the loss of one of
> their principal attractions, the barmaids, he took it into his head to
> establish something new, whereby *he could laugh in his sleeve* at the
> "smart Alecs" of Albany town, and started a saloon with no other
> performance than a piano and violin, similar to the German "museke" shops,
> where female waiters had been tolerated without let or hindrance,
> <end quote>
>
> Stephen Goranson
> http://people.duke.edu/~goranson/
>
>
> https://idnc.library.illinois.edu/cgi-bin/illinois?a=d&d=NYC18640102.2.8&e=-------en-20--1--img-txIN-%252522smart+alecs%252522--------
>
>

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