[Ads-l] Earliest Use of "Cool" as a General Term of Approval

[Shapiro, Fred]

Ben Zimmer's great discovery of a 1938 use of "cool" as a general term of approval is a tricky one for historical lexicography, and I'm not sure how the OED or the Oxford Dictionary of African American English should treat it.  Here is what I see in GenealogyBank.  The context is a report on an upcoming New Orleans band performance.

1938 Atlanta Daily World 6 Dec. 3/5  The band's mistress of ceremonies, Joan Lunceford, is one of the "smoothest articles" in front of an orchestra you ever saw ... and such swing-singing!  Many call her the equal of the famous Blanche Calloway.  And what [indecipherable] cool is that she's as [partially indecipherable] the band as she'd be in an evening gown — which is something.

I think it is clear that the problematic sections must have been something like "And what is especially cool is that she's as feminine in directing the band ..."  The words "feminine" and "directing" are partially obscured but are unmistakeable.

It seems to me that an historical dictionary might not be comfortable in printing this as a quotation, but at least the situation could be explained in a note.

Fred Shapiro


________________________________
From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Ben Zimmer <00001aae0710f4b7-dmarc-request at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, November 5, 2025 12:36 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Subject: Re: Earliest Use of "Cool" as a General Term of Approval

The 1939 cite, which Fred first shared back in May, looks great as an
antedating of "cool cat," but then the question is whether "cool" in that
context falls under OED sense 8b (general term of approval) or the earlier
8a (stylish, classy), or the even earlier 2c (composed, assured) or 2d
(audacious, impudent). In this case it could be a mixture of 2c/2d, as the
nickname "Ice Water" suggests someone who is assured/audacious.

It would be interesting to look at how "cool" was used in various nicknames
in the '20s and '30s. The great baseball player James Thomas Bell was
called "Cool (Papa)" perhaps as early as 1922, his first season as a Negro
League pitcher. That was because he was so composed and assured (and
perhaps audacious) on the mound. One might even say he had ice water in his
veins.

--bgz

On Tue, Nov 4, 2025 at 8:19 PM Shapiro, Fred <
00001ac016895344-dmarc-request at listserv.uga.edu> wrote:

> I have studied Ben Zimmer's postings about the word "cool" as a general
> term of approval.  He appears to regard a December 1938 citation as
> probably the earliest known occurrence of this sense, but he points out
> that the article in question, from the Atlanta Daily World, is not legible
> in the key passage.  Is the following then the earliest known example ?
>
> 1939 California Eagle 20 Apr. 8-A/4 (Newspapers.com)  Wonder does Jean
> Morris give all the girls the same line of "Jive?" ... of Helen Collins
> having a new boy friend: they say his names [sic] is "Ice Water," a cool
> cat, I suppose.
>
>

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