[Ads-l] Ginch (antedating to 1920)

[Bonnie Taylor-Blake]

Some time ago, Jonathan Lighter pushed "ginch" back to the University of
Wisconsin ca. 1926/1927. (Actually, I think the text he refers to is on
page 19 of the March 1927 issue of the School of Law's "The Gargoyle.")

https://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2011-August/111994.html

Here it is at Yale in 1920. (And at the University of Illinois by at least
the end of 1928.)

-- Bonnie

The product of Finch and the Chapel Street ginch are "sisters under the
skin."

[Y.G.S., "Q.E.D.," The Yale Record, 20 April 1920, p. 608;
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=yul.yg15_r_245_v48_i13&seq=18&q1=ginch
]

In 1924, TIME magazine explained that The Finch School in New York City was
one of the premier finishing schools of the time. It also revealed that
"[s]aid the *Yale Record*, in verses illustrative of womankind's universal
sorority: 'The girl from Finch and the Chapel Street ginch; Are sisters
under the skin.'"

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Time/wuiqBOhbo_4C?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22the+girl+from+finch+and+the+chapel+street+ginch%22&pg=RA37-PA17&printsec=frontcover

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

And there is little immediate likelihood of ginches on the Illinois campus
being forced to the extremities of some Northwestern girls to secure
escorts ...

["A School of Size," The Daily Illini, 29 December 1928, p. 4;
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-daily-illini-ginches-12291928/175126819/
]

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