[Ads-l] Does "The buck stops here'' stop here?

Fri Jun 14 17:34:28 UTC 2024

Since OED has the poker sense of "buck" from 1865, the basic question is
how "buck" came to be used in that way.  A "buck knife" is the obvious
possibility, but I don't see any early exx. of it shortened to "buck."

Early OED evidence specifies the "buck" as any small object, often a knife
or a pencil.

Antedating OED:

1856 _Weekly Bulletin_ [S.F.] (Oct. 27) 4 (GenealogyBank): This amusing
operation is conducted with all the apparent earnestness attention [sic]
that ever as many old "brag" players bestowed on a game for "five dollars
ante and pass the buck."

So the phrase was apparently known somewhat earlier than 1857.

 JL

On Fri, Jun 14, 2024 at 12:00 PM Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

> Nice work, all!  Is there any confirmation (or disconfirmation) from any
> of these sources that the origin of the reference to a buck in both “the
> buck stops here” and “passing the buck” is to a buck-handled knife
> (evidently distinct from the Buck knives named for the early 20th c.
> blacksmith/knife-maker Hoyt Buck) that traditionally rotated around the
> poker table to indicate whose turn it was to deal? Or is that an
> etymythology? The rotating buck-knife is the story I’ve always heard, but
> there’s no mention of, or even speculation about, this story in the
> citations.
>
> FWIW, Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_passing) uses the
> noncommittal evidential expression “is said to have” to describe the origin
> story:
> ============
> The expression is said to have originated from poker <
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poker> in which a marker or counter (such
> as a knife with a buckhorn handle during the American Frontier <
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Frontier> era) was used to
> indicate the person whose turn it was to deal <
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poker_dealer>. If the player did not wish
> to deal, the responsibility could be passed by the passing of the "buck <
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Button_(poker)>," as the counter came to be
> called, to the next player
> ============
>
> LH
>
> > On Jun 8, 2024, at 7:47 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> wrote:
> >
> > The cerebral hard drive must be slipping.
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Sat, Jun 8, 2024 at 6:07 AM ADSGarson O'Toole <
> adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> Thanks JL and Fred. Congratulations to Barry Popik on his excellent
> >> discovery.
> >>
> >> Barry clipped the citation on September 16, 2019.
> >>
> >>
> https://www.newspapers.com/article/lincoln-journal-star-the-buck-stops-her/36017495/
> >>
> >> As mentioned by Fred, the citation appears in "The New Yale Book of
> >> Quotations" (2021).
> >>
> >> In addition, JL mentioned the citation previously on January 16, 2023.
> >>
> https://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2023-January/163089.html
> >>
> >> The Quote Investigator article has been updated, at last. Changes
> >> should be visible within  24 hours. Barry Popik, Jonathan Lighter, and
> >> Fred Shapiro are acknowledged.
> >> https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/02/07/buck-stops/
> >>
> >> Garson
> >>
> >> On Fri, Jun 7, 2024 at 1:56 PM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> >> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> The 1929 citation is included in the New Yale Book of Quotations, which
> >> credits Barry Popik for discovering it.
> >>>
> >>> Fred Shapiro
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> ________________________________
> >>> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of
> >> Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> >>> Sent: Friday, June 7, 2024 1:43 PM
> >>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >>> Subject: Does "The buck stops here'' stop here?
> >>>
> >>> Twenty years ago on another thread I wrote:
> >>>
> >>> "I'm sticking to my story that I saw a reference to 'The Buck Stops
> Here'
> >>> on a little desk plaque in a story published during the '30s in _Our
> >> Army_
> >>> magazine."
> >>>
> >>> While not quite vindication, the following makes my statement nugatory:
> >>>
> >>> 1929  _Lincoln [Neb.] Evening Journal_  (Oct. 2)  13 (Newspapers.com):
> >> It's
> >>> about the second lieutenant in the war department whose desk was back
> in
> >>> the corner among the boxes and the barrels....Above this desk the
> second
> >>> looey had placed a card which read: "The buck stops here"...and he
> didn't
> >>> mean buck private.
> >>>
> >>> 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/
> >> <http://www.americandialect.org/>
> >>>
> >>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>> 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/
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> 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