[Ads-l] 86 speculation, anyone?

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Jesse Sheidlower wrote:
> The NYT just put a piece up about this, quoting me, and Green's Dictionary of Slang:

Excellent work, Jesse. Here is a different stable link to the New York
Times article:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/16/us/politics/james-comey-trump-86-meaning.html

Here is the link to Green's Dictionary of Slang, again:
https://greensdictofslang.com/entry/eaw7fwy

Barry Popik examined the 86 slang term in the soda-jerk, restaurant,
and bar domain, and Popik found a great 1933 column by Walter Winchell
which stated: "Eighty-six" means all out of it

 "86" (not from Chumley’s or Empire State Building)
https://barrypopik.com/blog/86_not_from_chumleys_or_empire_state_building

Ben Zimmer elucidated the topic in a 2018 article in the Atlantic:
 A Restaurant ‘Eighty-Sixed’ Sarah Huckabee Sanders. What Does That Mean?
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/06/a-restaurant-eighty-sixed-sarah-huckabee-sanders-what-does-that-mean/563588/

The earliest citation in Green's Dictionary of Slang (GDoS) for the
murder sense is from Jonathan Lighter's wonderful Historical
Dictionary of American Slang (HDAS) on page 700 and 701 of volume 1:

[Begin excerpt from GDoS website]
2. (US) to kill, murder; to execute judicially.
1978 [US]  in L.A. Times 15 Mar. I 26: At least it suggests that the
police haven’t 86ed (murdered) him [HDAS].
[End excerpt from GDoS website]

I attempted to antedate the murder/kill/terminate life sense, and I
found a 1968 citation about J. Maurice Treener who developed
Alka-Seltzer. When Treener died, a columnist in Newsday wrote: "When
the Good Lord eighty-sixed him from the bubbling fountain of life".
This is ambiguous, but the sense "terminated his life" is a natural
reading, I think.

Date: July 22, 1968
Newspaper: Newsday
Newspaper Location: Suffolk Edition
Article: Here's One for J. Maurice Treener
Author: Robert Mayer
Quote Page 4B, Column 1
Database: Newspapers.com

[Begin excerpt]
The size of a man's obituary is a measure of greatness
That society bestows on a man on the day of his lateness;
And in that connection it seems to me it was one of  journalism's biggest gaffes
To send to his final reward the man who invented Alka-Seltzer in the
rather stingy confines of two little paragraphs.

I never heard of Mr. Treneer until that day of mortal strife
When the Good Lord eighty-sixed him from the bubbling fountain of life,
But many is the day that I and my family and friends  have drunk to his health,
[End excerpt]

The Internet Archive has a 1978 edition of "The Synonym Finder" which
has multiple entries covering different senses of eighty-six including
assassinate. In the excerpt below "Sl." means slang.

Year: 1978
Book Title: The Synonym Finder (Completely Revised)
Editor in Chief: Laurence Urdang
Managing Editor: Nancy LaRouche
Quote Page 71
https://archive.org/details/synonymfinder0000roda/page/n3/mode/2up?q=%22eighty-six%22

[Begin excerpt]
assassinate, v. 1. kill, slay, morganize, poison, do to death,
liquidate, blot or wipe out, ...
Sl. off, hit, zap, waste, croak, eighty six, take off, rub out, bump
off, knock off, ...
[End excerpt]

Garson

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