Radio Script #276
Little Talks On Common Things
October 23, 1955
Let us start tonight with some additions to our collection of word origins.
suppose many peop Ie th ink the express ion t!mad as a hatter!! comes from the mad hatter in HAlice in Wonderland lf , but the phrase is much older than Lewis Carrol I ‘s classic story. It goes back to Anglo-Saxon times in Britain. The expression, in fact, has nothing to do with makers of hats. It was originally !’mad as an atterP , with no Hh H • The word Hatterli was Anglo-Saxon for viper or adder; at the same time Tlmad H was a synonym for poisonous. Thus the expression meant poisonous as an adder. By Lewis Carrol I ‘s time the confusion between !latter” and “hatter” had become so comp lete that he quite natura Ily made one of his characters the Mad Hatter.
How does revealing a trick or ruse come TO be called !fletTing the cat out of the bag n? At country fa irs in med i eva I Eng I and young pigs were common Iy sold. The pigs were customari Iy fastened in bags so thaT the buyer could easi Iy carry home his purchase. But some of the se I lers were tri cky fe I lows • Thev brought their bags tied up, with a cat inside instead of a pig. The unwary buyer, thinking every bag contained a pig: would buy one unopened: hence giving rise to another expression that has come down through the years, Ha pig in a poke”, for the 0 I d word for bag or sack, sti I I used in parts of our own South, was Hpoke H • As buyers began to catch on TO the cat tri ck; they opened the bag and inspected its conTents before agree i ng to buy. That was !! letti ng the cat out of The bag!l.
The phrase TfnOT enough room TO sw i ng a catH has noth i ng to do with the animal, however. It refers, rather, to old days in the British Navy, when flogging was common punishment. The whip, The vicious cat-o-nine tails, was commonly called the Hcat”. The wielder of that whip needed room to swing it. How do we come to say !’Hobson’s choi ce <, when one has no cho i ce at a II? In 17th century England there lived at Cambridge an inn-keeper named Tobias Hobson.
He Re~t a stable of some forty horses always ready for hire. When a customer asked for a horse, he was taken to the stable where, although there was plenty of choice, he was obliged to take the horse that stood nearest the door.
Hobson decreed that arrangement in order to assure that every customer was served a like by sheer chance and that every horse was used in turn. I f a customer comp la i ned, the grooms were instructed to say, ~” t ‘s that horse or none. You have Hobson’s choice.”
Why do we say The “naked truth”? A very old fab Ie has it that Fa Isehood and Truth went togeTher to bathe in a stream. Falsehood came first out of the water and dressed in Truth’s garments. Truth, unwi I ling to put on Falsehood’s clothes, went away naked.
Let’s close this part of the program with mention of a homely old phrase, “up the spout”, meaning lost and gone, defeated and done with. This is an allusion to the ancient pawnbroker’s shop, where goods received were pushed up a spout into an overhead room for storage. Since so few pawned qoods were ever redeemed, the exp ress i on “up the spout” came to be app lied to any pres umed loss.
I am often asked what was Maine’s first regularly published almanac. I am glad to say that it was just what many of you suppose, the Maine Farmer’s Almanac.
I have seen a copy of its very first number, in the collection of my friend Walter Heath. So you may know when you encounter an authentic copy, let me te II you what to look for. Fi rst, the correct ti tie is HThe Ma i ne Farmer’s AlmanackT!, spelled with a uk”, HFor the Year of Our Lord 1819′!. Then come the words :!calculated for the latitude and meridian of Hallowell, Maine. By Moses Springer, Jr., Hal lowe I I.Tf Then right on the title page you are told where the almanac is for sa Ie. nPri nted and pub I i shed by E. Gooda Ie. So I d by him at his store, wholesale and reTai I, and by S. K. Gi Iman, Hallowell; M. Springer, Gardiner; H. Staples, AugusTa; J. Partridge, Watervi lie; D. Stone, Brunswick= Isaac Adams and W. Hyde, PorTland; Enoch Goodale, Saco; John Babson, Wiscasset; Ladd and Morri I I, Belfast; Bradley and LiTtle, Bucksport; and by traders in general. Price $9 a gross, 85 cents a dozen, 12t cents a single copy.”
In our day of rapid transportation there is no difficulTy in confining all except the municipal courts TO one place in each county, the shire town or county seat. In 1’820, when Ma i ne fi rst became a separate state, it was not so.
From Augusta to Watervi I Ie was quite a journey, as it was indeed from Brunswick to Portland. So in 1820 Cumberland County court sessions were held not only in Portland, but also in Brunswick, Gorham, Yarmouth, STandish and Freeport.
Kennebec County sessions were fixed not only for Augusta, but also for Monmouth, Winthrop, Winslow, Vassalboro, Mt. Vernon and Readfield. Over the state courts were held at \~arren and Waldoboro, at Buckfield and Fryeburg, at Anson and Starks, at Columbia and Cherryfield, at Castine and Frankfort. And the old records show that those scattered sessions were needed.
travel difficult. Uur Maine ancestors had a lot of litigation. law much more quickly than we do today.
Not on Iy was
They went to
One of the old time almanacs to attract the curious eyes of the historian was called the ·’Temperance AlmanacH , published in 1824. Its sub-head said:
nCal cu I ated genera I I Y for a II parts of the U.S. and Canada; conta in i ng, bes ides the usual astronomical calculaTions, many valuable suggestions and important statements on the subject of Temperance. The leading article is a long discourse about a mother and chi Id, showing at first a mother feeding a baby gin and waTer to keep it quiet; then following the baby through chi Idhood to man- chood~ growing more and more dependent upon alcohol, ending as a drunkard in jai I. The whole is accompanied by a dozen crude woodcuts. The dialogue gets in its knocks at other th i ngs bes i des a I coho I. One passage says: HLook at the picture. You see al I of these men have segars in their mouths, except two of them who are too drunk to smoke. have hard Iy ever known a hard dri nker who did not use tobacco, which is also a form of intemperance and is often the first step toward dri nki ng.!I
The picture referred to depicts the bar-room of a tavern at the time of an election. On the wall is a theater poster and on the table a pack of cards. Smoking, going to the theater, and card playing were al lone with alcohol as companion evi Is to the temperance advocates in 1824.
Yet we must remember that it was those ear Iy temperance crusaders who changed tremendously the American attitude toward alcohol. For 75 years, from 1850 to 1925, drtnking of alcoholic beverages, however much it continued to be i ndu I ged in, was not respectab Ie. A part of our serious alcoholic problem today is that the use of alcoholic beverages has come to be stamped. increasingly with social respectabi lity and to be accepted even by many church people. By a large majority in our day, it is only the excessive use of alcohol that is condemned. For that very reason we find the whole problem much harder to combat than it was a generati on ago. Some of us sti I I be I i eve strong Iy that a I coho I is soc i a I Iy our greatest potenti a I evi I •
The early almanacs did not make day by day, or even week by week, weather predictions for the whole year in advance. Instead they told people how to be ready to pred i ct the weather for themse I ves. For instance, the Ma i ne Farmer! s
Almanac for 1820 says: “If in the morning, before the sun rises, the eastern sky looks pale, and refracted beams stream up in divergent rays above the horizon, sudden tempests accompanied by hai J may S00n be expected. A continual shaking of dry leaves which remain in the beech trees, when little wind is observed elsewhere, indicates sudden storms. If a storm rises with the sun, at sunset iT will beg into abate and wi I I cease about mi dn i ght. When the noon is four days old, if she has her horns very sharp and pointed, fai r weather will continue till the moon be full. Fish often rising and bubbling at the top of the water; cattle feeding without often looking around; scattering white clouds in the northwest; bees flying far from their hives — all these things pred i ct a long spe II of fa i r weather.”
Did you know that when the Maine Constitution was drafted in 1820, a person was not required to be of voting age in order to be elected a member of the House of Representatives? The document very carefully speci fied that a voter must have aTtained the age of 21, but concerning the two houses of the legislature th is is what the Consti tuti on sa i d: “The Senate sha II cons i st of not less than 21 nor more than 31 members, each of whom sha II have reached the age of 25 years. The House of Representati ves sha II cons i st of not less than 100 nor more than 200 members.” How 01 d ~st they be? The Consti tuti on di dn ‘t sav.
Tw i ce i n recent weeks we have referred to items in the ‘t/atervi lie Un i on, pub I i shed more than a hundred years ago by the founder of one of Watervi lie’s most important modern indus tri es, the C. F.:, aThaway Company. It is ti me we told you more about Mr. Hathaway’s newspaper. The man had come to Watervi I Ie in 1841 from his native home in Plymouth, Mass., where he had learned shirt maki ng in the sma I I factory run by an unc Ie. Hathaway marri ed a Watervi lie girl, bui It a factory on the site of the company’s present Atherton street p I ant, and became acti ve in many affa irs, especi ally re I i gi ous ones. He was a heated, conTroversial figure, and he often felt he was not duly listened to.
Like many another such man, he decided the best way to get attention was to start his own newspaper. So in 1847 he offered to the pub Ii c the \~atervi lie Un ion, concerni ng wh i ch the masthead statement sa i d: TTpub I i shed every Th ursday morning by Charles F. Hathaway. Office in Hanscom’s Bui Iding on Main and E 1m Streets. Terms, on Iy one dol I ar a year in advance. The pub Ii c will see that this is the cheapest paper in New England of its size and quality. We are determined it shall in every respect, as far as our ability reaches, merit the most extensive circulation. We hope to receive many subscriptions fram our friends and the public by mail; and when money is received, receipts will be given. Those friendly to the paper are requested to do what they can to extend its circulation, and they wi I I receive our thanks and suitable compansation.
“Anyone who wi I I send us the money for five or ten new s ubscr i be rs may reserve ten per cent commission. Po9tmasters wi II send money to us for subscriptions free of postage. Wanted — several active traveling agents, to whom a good chance is offered. Advertisers wi I I find this paper affording them the greatest faci I ities for thei r purposes. Adverti sements wi II be inserted at 1011 rates, cash in advance. Those at a distance can send their advertisements with proper directions, and we will advertise to the amount of the money they send.”
I t turned out that the pub I i c were not enough interested in the re Ii gi ous homi I ies and Puritanical advice with which Hathaway fi lied his paper to keep the sheet going very long. It folded up in less than a year. As a historical record it is valuable principally for its advertisements, concerning which you shall hear more on some future broadcast. Let’s close tonight with just one of those old ads. Here is what it says:
f~eeth! Teeth! Teeth! Dr. B. Burbank, surgeon, dentist and manufacturer of mi nera I teeth. Rooms in Hanscom’s Bui I ding. Prepared to adm in i ster the etherea I vapor by wh i ch roots and cavi ous teeth can be removed without the least sufferi ng to the pati ent.”
And with that sooth i ng announcement of 108 years ago, we must say good night for old times’ sake.
Year: 1955