[Ads-l] Antedating of "Slammer" (Jail)

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Excellent point, Ben. Thanks for your careful analysis.
Garson

On Sat, Jun 21, 2025 at 7:58 PM Ben Zimmer
<00001aae0710f4b7-dmarc-request at listserv.uga.edu> wrote:
>
> There's a date discrepancy here. The May 2, 1936 cite that Fred provided is
> from the City Edition of the Chicago Defender.
>
> https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-chicago-defender/174971363/
>
> The GDoS cite from May 9 is from the Defender's National Edition, which
> evidently waited a week to run Dan Burley's column. (The National Edition
> is available on ProQuest.)
>
> On Sat, Jun 21, 2025 at 7:33 PM ADSGarson O'Toole <
> 00001aa1be50b751-dmarc-request at listserv.uga.edu> wrote:
>
> > Also listed in Jonathon Green's wonderful dictionary of slang
> > https://greensdictofslang.com/entry/ds5zssa#sn2a
> > 1936 D. Burley in Chicago Defender 9 May 23: Back Door’s Revised
> > Dictionary [...] the slammer - 48th St. jail.
> >
> > On Sat, Jun 21, 2025 at 10:36 AM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > slammer (OED, n.1, 1952)
> > >
> > > 1936 Dan Burley in Chicago Defender 2 May 24/1 (Newspapers.com)
> > >
> > > THE SLAMMER - 48th St. jail.
> >
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org