[Ads-l] "Who was Kilroy?" June 26, 1945 (in-print antedating?)

Fri Mar 26 14:46:16 UTC 2021

I want to be open-minded, but the 1943 button is just too early to be true, and perhaps the 1944 airplane name as well.  Also, to me the supposedly 1943 button seems to be founded on the saying being already well-known, which clearly it was not in 1943.

Fred Shapiro

________________________________
From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
Sent: Friday, March 26, 2021 10:34 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Subject: Re: "Who was Kilroy?" June 26, 1945 (in-print antedating?)

This photo of a button promoting war bond appears to show a "Kilroy" -
complete with portrait - from 1943:

https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.kilroywashere.org%2F001-Pages%2F01-0KilroySightings-4.html&data=04%7C01%7Cfred.shapiro%40yale.edu%7C00b77a2345cc4ac62dbb08d8f0644c2f%7Cdd8cbebb21394df8b4114e3e87abeb5c%7C0%7C0%7C637523660854845036%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=o4X4FxceJ%2BIyHtTfGAGeG%2FyU98Dy75JrFw7C7iCR64s%3D&reserved=0

"BUY WAR BONDS   KILROY WAS HERE    WASH. DC 1943."

And here is a (restored) C-47 named "KILROY" IS HERE (with cartoon) that
took part in the D-Day invasion in June, 1944:

https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.combatairmuseum.org%2Faircraft%2Fdouglasskytrain.html&data=04%7C01%7Cfred.shapiro%40yale.edu%7C00b77a2345cc4ac62dbb08d8f0644c2f%7Cdd8cbebb21394df8b4114e3e87abeb5c%7C0%7C0%7C637523660854845036%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=9gBjOM%2FyeL7u3L5v2If1IhCxfA1PnV7NdRJHf5g1wWU%3D&reserved=0

Regrettably, the site doesn't afford a contemporaneous photo of the plane.

WW2 photos of the Kilroy sign appear to be almost nonexistent online.

That leads me to believe its frequency during WW2 may have been
considerably exaggerated.

JL

On Fri, Mar 26, 2021 at 9:32 AM ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>
wrote:

> In March 1945 the "Fort Worth Star-Telegram" printed a letter signed
> by Pvt. W. P. Kilroy who stated that he was stationed at Sheppard
> Field, Texas. He complained about the "tall tales" told by Texans.
>
> Perhaps W. P. Kilroy was the target of a practical joke that
> escalated. Alternatively, his name was coincidental.
>
> Date: March 18, 1945
> Newspaper: Fort Worth Star-Telegram
> Newspaper Location: Fort Worth, Texas
> Article: Letters From the People - Sick of Tall Tales
> Author: Pvt. W. P. Kilroy
> Section 2, Quote Page 3, Column 2
> Database: Newspapers.com
>
> https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newspapers.com%2Fimage%2F637560396%2F%3Fterms%3DKILROY&data=04%7C01%7Cfred.shapiro%40yale.edu%7C00b77a2345cc4ac62dbb08d8f0644c2f%7Cdd8cbebb21394df8b4114e3e87abeb5c%7C0%7C0%7C637523660854845036%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=0F5IQ2o7hUX8%2B0Ihjq%2Fhsr6%2BqAmgp2Tw%2BvcAWGbet6c%3D&reserved=0
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> Speaking seriously, I was stationed in Pyote 53 weeks and have been
> here at Sheppard Field since Nov. 13, and I am sick of the bragging
> the people of Texas call "tall tales." . . .
> . . . but all this bragging gives Texas a bad name with the hundreds
> of thousands of soldiers who have trained in its many Army Navy and
> Air Force installations. How many Easterners do you think will come
> back to Texas to live after the war? Darn few!
> PVT. W. P. KILROY
> Sheppard Field, Texas
> [End excerpt]
>
> Garson
>
> On Thu, Mar 25, 2021 at 9:23 AM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> wrote:
> >
> > The forthcoming New Yale Book of Quotations notes that the Texacts
> newspaper of the Sheppard Field Army base in Texas posed the question "Who
> is Kilroy?" in its April 21, 1945 issue.
> >
> > Fred Shapiro
> >
> >
> > ________________________________
> > From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of
> Stephen Goranson <goranson at DUKE.EDU>
> > Sent: Thursday, March 25, 2021 9:10 AM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Subject: Re: "Who was Kilroy?" June 26, 1945 (in-print antedating?)
> >
> > "Who is Kilroy?"
> > Sgt. Roger Angell
> > Google Books
> >
> > SG
> > ________________________________
> > From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of
> Stephen Goranson <goranson at DUKE.EDU>
> > Sent: Thursday, March 25, 2021 8:50 AM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Subject: "Who was Kilroy?" June 26, 1945 (in-print antedating?)
> >
> > A story by Rogel Angell (likely (?) the later-famous baseball writer,
> who was in the Army Air Forces), Brief vol. 2, no. 30 (title page missing,
> but by sequence)   page 18/1 [my elipses] [also in later issues of this
> title, including a letter to editor speculation, July 17 p. 2/3]:
> >
> > Who is Kilroy?
> > Kilroy is the guy who just stepped out of the orderly room as you came
> in. Kilroy was in the latrine....latest AAF gag. ....  [Kilroy 4x]...
> "Kilroy ditched here." Kilroy will be here any day, but you won't see him.
> >
> > Stephen Goranson
> >
> https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http:%2F%2Fpeople.duke.edu%2F~goranson%2F&data=04%7C01%7Cfred.shapiro%40yale.edu%7C00b77a2345cc4ac62dbb08d8f0644c2f%7Cdd8cbebb21394df8b4114e3e87abeb5c%7C0%7C0%7C637523660854845036%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=oO9jZgrqJ0kKGoqX7MtoTPx7SPP0FfofJICPgFTXBPA%3D&reserved=0
> >
> > PS On "in-print":
> > Robert Capa, Slightly Out of Focus (NY, 1947) page 210 reports seeing,
> near Christmastime 1944:
> >
> > On the black, charred walls of an abandoned farm [near Bastogne]
> scrawled in white chalk, was the legend of McAuliffe's GI's: KILROY WAS
> STUCK HERE.
> >
> >
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--
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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