history of "hello"?

[samuels at anthro.umass.edu]

I'm hoping someone can send me to some good references on this.

In Claude S. Fischer's "America calling: a social history of the telphone
to 1940," I've read the following:

(pg. 71) AT&T tried at first to supress "hello" as a vulgarity. It failed
decisively, so much so that it later endorrsed the nickname, hello-girls,
for its operators.

(pg. 186) In the late 1940s answering a call with "hello" - the battle
against which AT&T had long ago surrendered - was still controversial to
society advice-givers. Millicent Fenwick judged that "Hello" wwas not,
according to tradition, proper form for servants, but was acceptable among
equals. Margarey Wilson wrote, "When answering the telephone it is
perfectly correct to say 'Hello.' Some people seem to find that it is
undignified...[b]ut experiment shows that any other words sound funnier
still.

Does anyone know the social history of "hello" as a greeting? Is there
literature on the subject? (Similarly, I've heard that "O.K." originated as
telegraph lingo.)

Many thanks for all responses.

David


David W. Samuels
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
212 Machmer Hall
University of Massachusetts
Amherst, MA 01003

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email: samuels at anthro.umass.edu
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wot 2 be got 2 be