[Ads-l] years young

[Laurence Horn]

I wonder how many years old one has to be before one can be described as n years young.  Seems like it doesn’t work for anyone short of being a sexa-, or possibly even septua-, genarian.  

—LH, 75 years middle-aged


> On Sep 3, 2020, at 2:55 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> 1879 _N.Y. Times_ (Dec. 21, 1873) 2: The Roxburgh Club...is now sixty-one
> years old, or sixty-one years young, for the young blood circulating
> therein has given a new lease to the club's vitality.
> 
> 
> Former presidential candidate Samuel J. Tilden (1814-1886) is meant:
> 
> 1884 _Alllentown [Pa.] Critic_  (May 27) 2: A cotemporary [sic] speaks of
> your Uncle Tilden as only seventy years young. Many a youth north of that
> age is earning his living by the sweat of his brow here in Allentown. To
> call the Greystone Sage old is an insult to many a Lehigh countian.
> 
> I haven't checked OED, but I thought the antiquity of these exx. might be
> diverting.
> 
> JL
> 
> -- 
> "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

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