[Ads-l] antedating "birdbrain"

[Andy Bach]

“ ... authorizes its owner to write "keerds" to boost himself or his
friends, or to "get even" with somebody ...”

So googling “keerds” all I got were dialect versions (Bret Harte in minimg
camps, etc) of “cards”, as in playing cards. This seems to mean something
else. Does anybody know?

On Tue, Oct 27, 2020 at 2:05 PM ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Peter Reitan wrote:
> > "Bird-brained" from as early as 1905.
> >
> > Several examples in the 1910s on HathiTrust.
> >
> > 1905 on Newspapers.com.
> >
> > "The "piece" writers of a moribund Publication that has a mill stone
> around its neck, bird-brained individuals who think ownership of a share of
> stock qualifies and authorizes its owner to write "keerds" to boost himself
> or his friends, or to "get even" with somebody are getting busy and like
> the cuttle-fish are endeavoring, to becloud the situation as to local
> politics and to set up a gigantic straw man and wallop him unmercifully."
> >
> > News-Journal, Mansfield, Ohio,
> > 24 Jun 1905, Page 4
> >
> > https://www.newspapers.com/clip/61946900/news-journal/
>
> Excellent work, Peter. The OED has a separate section for:
> bird-brained adj. having a small brain; figurative inattentive,
> flighty (cf. bird-witted adj.).
>
> The first OED citation for "bird brained" is 1922 which you have
> greatly improved upon.
>
> Garson
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
-- 
Andy Bach
Afbach at gmail.com
Not at my desk

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