[Ads-l] mysterious antedatings of "foo fighter"

[Jonathan Lighter]

I first heard about WW2 foo fighters in 1960 or so

They were "explained" as cockpit reflections, the moon, Venus, and St.
Elmo's fire.

So obvious....

JL

On Wed, Apr 12, 2023 at 8:11 PM Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

> Apparently a WWII (or, the above suggests, a slightly pre-WWII) designation
> for what we now call UFOs.  Who knew?  (Well, probably some of you, but not
> me.)
>
>
>
> https://www.sandboxx.us/blog/lets-talk-about-foo-fighters-no-not-dave-grohls-band/
>
> (There's also a wikipedia page, but nothing that would predict occurrences
> as early as 1939, much less in Texas and Indiana. But typos seems unlikely.
> Maybe time-travelers--there are a lot of time-travel scenarios set during
> that period.)
>
> LH
>
> On Wed, Apr 12, 2023 at 4:33 PM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > OED: 1945
> >
> > 1939  _Tyler [Tex.] Morning Telegraph_ (July 15) 6: Standings in the
> Peewee
> > baseball league...Dead End Kids...Junior
> > Trojans...Wildcats...Dooflunkies...Foo Fighters.
> >
> > 1939 _Franklin [Ind.] Evening Star_ (Sept. 22) 4: Volley ball..."Black
> > Panthers," "Golden Panthers," "Foo Fighters," and "Sterling Flashes."
> >
> > Weird typos?  Or just weird?
> >
> > 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
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


-- 
"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