[Ads-l] ufo, etc.

[Jonathan Lighter]

 1953 Project Blue Book Report, Jones Beach, N.Y. (Sept. 3)  [3]: RE PAR 53
AFR 2 23-2 UFOB CLN.

1953 Project Blue Book Report, Holloman AFB, N.M. (Oct. 7) 2: SUBJ
UFOB...THE UFOB WAS FIRST AND LAST SEEN IN THE VICINITY OF THE RKT VAPOR
TRAIL.

<http://goog_337238598>
https://archive.org/details/1953-09-6979770-JonesBeach-NewYork/page/n3/mode/2up?q=UFOB

https://archive.org/details/1953-10-6980981-Holloman-NewMexico/page/n1/mode/2up?q=UFOB

Both antedate OED's first ex. of "UFO" (Nov., 1953).

The acronym UFOB is routinely used (along with "UFO" in running text) in
Blue Book Reports for the next fifteen years:

1968 Project Blue Book Report, Redlands, Calif. (Feb. 4) 6: UFOB WORKSHEET.

https://archive.org/details/1968-02-6889701-Redlands-California/page/n5/mode/2up?q=UFOB

1975 David Michael Jacobs _The UFO Controversy in America_ (Bloomington:
Indiana U.P.) 134: Hardin, Hynek, and members of the 4602d devised a "UFOB
Guide" for this purpose.


JL

On Wed, Jun 15, 2005 at 9:17 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at yahoo.com>
wrote:

> The USAF evidently also used the official acronym "UFOB" for a time.
> Apparently it postdated the coinage of "UFO."
>
> The Air Force presumably felt that "UFO" had become too popular a term and
> needed to be replaced by new jargon.
>
> Here is an official document from 1954 that employs "UFOB" :
>
> http://www.cufon.org/cufon/afr200-2.htm
>
> JL
>
> *"Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET <douglas at NB.NET>>* wrote:
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: "Douglas G. Wilson"
> Subject: Re: ufo, etc.
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> By free association: here is a little spelling error which really and truly
> appeared repeatedly in the French-language press around 1970 (although this
> example is copied from the Web):
>
> <celle-ci en revint à la conclusion initiale: les U.F.O. étaient des
> engins
> interplanétaires. D'où nouvelle contre-attaque des opposants avec la
> création, en 1967, du comité Condom.>>
>
> I don't know whether there's any significance to this. Does it qualify as
> an eggcorn? (^_^)
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>
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