[Ads-l] Antedating of "Tick-Tack-Toe"

[Jonathan Lighter]

I've got some more, though it isn't quite clear which game is alluded to:

1879_ Chicago Tribune_ (Sept. 4) 5: Is one Nicholas Bramgan, recently
liberated from the Penitentiary at Joliet, in the employ of the city as
policeman or give-away, or is he simply playing a little game of "tick,
tack, toe," like Martin Flanagan?JL

1885 _St. Albans [Vt.] Daily Messenger_ (Feb. 28) 3: Even the teacher
will... take a slate and sit down wit [sic] a girl and play what is called
tick-tack-toe.

It may be that "tic-tac-toe" began as a counting rhyme like
eeny-meeny-miny-mo:

1885 _Washington Standard_ (Olympia, Wash.) (Nov. 6) 1: Tic, tac, toe; let
the Chinese lepers go./...Get out of this, get out of that./ Tic-tac-toe.

There's this:

1862 _Weekly Times (Burlington, Vt.) (Nov. 8) 7: NEW MUSIC.
Songs....Kingdom Coming (Negro melody)....Tick-Tack-Toe, - A song for the
times.

And:

1874 _Manchester Guardian_  (March 6) 6: The children in [the painting]
"Tick! Tack! Toe!"...are just as bad.

JL

On Wed, Jul 12, 2023 at 7:39 PM ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Interesting topic, JL. Excellent lead, Fred.
> The phrase "Tic-tac-toe, three in a row" occurs below in 1878 (I
> think), but it is not clear whether it refers to the game of today.
>
> Part of the text is cut off in the scan.
>
> Date: 1878 October
> Periodical: New Dominion Monthly
> Published by John Dougall & Son, Montreal
> Section: Young Folks
> Article: A Life in the Stage: A Story for Boys
> Start Page 462, Quote Page 466, Column 2
>
>
> https://books.google.com/books?id=V685RfuwRmQC&q=%22Tic%2C+tac%22#v=snippet&
>
> [Begin excerpt - please double check text and date]
> But can this comfortable, ea...
> going man, who walks up to the v...
> andah and seating himself on the
> vacant chair says with a quiet laugh
> "Tic-tac-toe, three in a row--...
> this be our little thin, pale-faced S...
> [End excerpt]
>
> The cut-off words might be "easy" and veranda".
>
> Garson
>
> On Wed, Jul 12, 2023 at 7:03 PM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> wrote:
> >
> > Correction: In the 1908 citation it is "tack" rather than "tock."
> >
> > Fred Shapiro
> >
> >
> >
> > ________________________________
> > From: Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> > Sent: Wednesday, July 12, 2023 7:01 PM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Subject: Antedating of "Tick-Tack-Toe"
> >
> > tick-tack-toe (OED, b., 1960)
> >
> > 1895 _St. Louis Post-Dispatch_ 10 Dec. 7/1 (Newspapers.com)  It was
> "tick, tack, toe, three in a row."
> >
> > 1908 _Cincinnati Enquirer_ 9 July 2/6 (Newspapers.com)  Up to the stage
> they went, tick, tock, toe, three in a row. like the figures we used to
> make on our slate when the teacher wasn't looking.
> >
> > Fred Shapiro
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > 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