[Ads-l] 'jarhead' (a soldier) antedatings

Wed Jan 18 17:11:32 UTC 2023

Taken together these are quite interesting. 1933 seems to refer
unequivocally to Army soldiers, as "USAT" stands for "U.S. Army
Transport" and the marines are giving the army crew the runaround.

 In 1936 it isn't at all clear whether "Gyrene" and "Jar-head" are
synonyms or complementary terms.

But it doesn't matter since 1935 almost certainly means "marine." The
story concerns a Soldier (capitalized) and an anonymous Marine (also
"Leatherneck" and "Gyrene," all consistently capitalized). It's the
soldier who calls to the marine "Hey, Jar-head" (note capitalization).

The story is set in 1918, but whether the writer was calling on
first-hand experience isn't clear. (A note says the story was
reprinted from the pulp _Battle Stories_, no date given.)

If jarhead 'marine' existed in 1918, its use must have been pretty
uncommon, and (if the story is based on experience) possibly
restricted to certain units of marines or soldiers in France. This
seems to have been true even in the years before WW2. In the early
'70s I read hundreds and hundreds of first-person WW1 accounts with an
especial eye out for slang terms associated with later generations,
including "jahead," with which I was familiar. I discovered no
"jarheads" but countless "leathernecks" and not a few "gyrenes" (an
influence on "jarhead"?). Both "leatherneck" and "gyrene" are well
attested years before WW1.

But I was also looking for "dogface" (army soldier), which was nearly
as well known in WW2 as "GI." I found none. Fifty years later the
miracle of newspaper databases revealed examples, used apparently in a
single army unit at the end of the war, and I posted them here. As a
word for a soldier (never a Marine) it only became common (in print,
anyway) after 1941.

The 1935 or earlier "jarhead" seems to exemplify the same phenomenon:
a very uncommon term rising to prominence and familiarity only decades
later.  (Same for 19th-century "leatherneck" and "gyrene" and "woke.")

Good sleuthing, James.

JL

On Tue, Jan 17, 2023 at 12:48 AM James Eric Lawson <jel at nventure.com> wrote:
>
> These from 1933, 1935 and 1936 may be examples from _Leatherneck_
> in the 1930s, although I have my doubts about the meaning of the
> 1933 and 1936 examples.  The "marine" sense of the 1935 example
> seems fairly certain, although it also could be equivocal, I
> suppose.
>
> 1933  *Q.M. SCHOOL BREVITIES* _The Leatherneck_ 16/5 38/3
> Sergeants Kramer, Green and Carrick sure gave the Army the run
> around on the USAT *Republic*. Upon embarking they moved into the
> second class cabins, and it took three days and a squad of
> “jar-heads” to get them and the baggage moved to the troop class.
> The skipper got a growl in New York because they had to move their
> baggage themselves.
>
>      http://archive.org/details/sim_leatherneck_1933-05_16_5/
>
> 1935  *BROTHERS UNDER THE TIN* _The Leatherneck_ 18/4 61/2  “Hey,
> Jar-head,” said Chuck, halting abruptly, “there ain’t no use in
> traveling any farther. That barrage isn’t advancing any more; I’ll
> bet it doesn’t even reach that line of machine guns. You don’t see
> any of the gunners falling back, do you? We’ll never get out if we
> go any deeper inside the lines.”
>
> The barrage had apparently reached its limits and was sweeping
> back and forth with ineffectual ferocity in front of the echeloned
> machine guns.
>
> "Damn fool soldiers," grunted the Marine. “Why don’t they raise
> that barrage? Doesn’t do any good where it is.”
>
>      http://archive.org/details/sim_leatherneck_1935-04_18_4/
>
> 1936  *SKIMMED FROM THE SCUTTLE-BUTT: EUPHONIOUS, TOO* _The
> Leatherneck_ 19/5 11/1  Gyrene: “I thought you had a date ashore
> with some blonde tonight.”
>
> Jar-head: “I did; but when I got near her house I saw her going
> down the street with some other guy, so I called it off.”
>
>      http://archive.org/details/sim_leatherneck_1936-05_19_5/
>
>
> On 1/16/23 08:27, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> > Nice finds. The 1930 is interesting, but it seems just to mean
> > "blockhead" - esp. since it's in an ad, not the main text.
> >
> > If it means "marine," there should be other exx. in _Leatherneck_
> > through the 1930s. I don't see any. The Army team is frequently called
> > "Jarheads." (The Marine team is the 'Devil Dogs.')
> >
> >   JL
> >
> >
> > On Mon, Jan 16, 2023 at 2:08 AM ADSGarson O'Toole
> > <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> Back in 2010 JL found some citations starting in 1926 in which members
> >> of the U.S. Army football team were called jarheads (the team's mascot
> >> was a mule)
> >>
> >> https://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2010-February/096857.html
> >>
> >> On Mon, Jan 16, 2023 at 12:41 AM James Eric Lawson <jel at nventure.com> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> OEDO senses 2a ("member of the United States Army") 1931, and 2b
> >>> ("member of the United States Marine Corps) 1944. Green ("a US
> >>> Marine") 1943. ADS-L, Lighter, 1918 ("Artilleryman"), 1942
> >>> (soldier).
> >>>
> >>> 1930  *Telling The Marines! [ad]* _The Leatherneck_ 13/6 33 No
> >>> wonder the little dame is giving her Marine the works!  No female
> >>> loves a briar that smells like a Chinese fish market.  Now if this
> >>> jar-head had used Sir Walter Raleigh in his pipe, you’d see the
> >>> skirt with her arms around our hero, while the fragrant smoke
> >>> wafted its way skyward.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> https://archive.org/details/sim_leatherneck_1930-06_13_6/page/n34/mode/1up?q=%22jar-head%22
> >>>
> >>> 1932  *Army “Slanguage”* _Recruiting news_ 6–7  An Army mule is a
> >>> "jar head ” or a Missouri Mustang. Soldiers of a machine gun
> >>> company are also “jar heads” to their buddies but - when you call
> >>> ’em that, stranger, smile!
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uiug.30112099968973&view=page&seq=184&q1=jar-head
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> James Eric Lawson
> >>>
> >>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>> 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
>
> --
> James Eric Lawson
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> 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."

------------------------------------------------------------
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