[Ads-l] antedating "commie"

[Jonathan Lighter]

1931 _Knoxville [Tenn.] News-Sentinel_ (Nov. 29) B-5: Police Battle
'Commies' ...DETROIT ...Five persons, including two police, were
injured...when Communist agitators led 2000 unemployed on Grand Circus Park.

Earlier it referred to a kind of child's marble:

1923 _Plain Dealer_ (Cleveland, O.) (June 28) 26:United States marble
championship... Harlan McCoy, 14, ...king of the commies.

And to a member of the Decatur (IIlinois) Commodores, a minor league ball
team (1900-1974):

1907 _Herald and Review_ (Decatur, Ill.) (Sept. 12) 3: Tale Of How Commies
Lost The Pennant.

1917 Ibid. (Apr. 20) 5: "Ziggy" Scherer...formerly cavorted in the outfield
with the Decatur Commies.

Earlier still, as "Commy," the usual nickname of Charles A. Comiskey,
player and later president of the Chicago Amerians (today's White Sox).

1890 _Sioux City Journal_ (Jan. 29) 3: And "Commy" nodded assent.


JL
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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