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KF5JRV > TODAY 23.03.19 11:15z 43 Lines 2223 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 33169_KF5JRV
Read: GUEST
Subj: Today in History - Mar 23
Path: HB9ON<IW8PGT<IZ3LSV<F1OYP<ON0AR<GB7CIP<N3HYM<KF5JRV
Sent: 190323/1115Z 33169@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.18
On this day in 1839, the initials “O.K.ö are first published in The
Boston Morning Post. Meant as an abbreviation for “oll korrect,ö a
popular slang misspelling of “all correctö at the time, OK steadily made
its way into the everyday speech of Americans.
During the late 1830s, it was a favorite practice among younger,
educated circles to misspell words intentionally, then abbreviate them
and use them as slang when talking to one another. Just as teenagers
today have their own slang based on distortions of common words, such as
“kewlö for “coolö or “DZö for “these,ö the “in crowdö of the 1830s had a
whole host of slang terms they abbreviated. Popular abbreviations
included “KYö for “No useö (“know yuseö), “KGö for “No goö (“Know goö),
and “OWö for all right (“oll wrightö).
Of all the abbreviations used during that time, OK was propelled into
the limelight when it was printed in the Boston Morning Post as part of
a joke. Its popularity exploded when it was picked up by contemporary
politicians. When the incumbent president Martin Van Buren was up for
reelection, his Democratic supporters organized a band of thugs to
influence voters. This group was formally called the “O.K. Club,ö which
referred both to Van Buren’s nickname “Old Kinderhookö (based on his
hometown of Kinderhook, New York), and to the term recently made popular
in the papers. At the same time, the opposing Whig Party made use of
“OKö to denigrate Van Buren’s political mentor Andrew Jackson. According
to the Whigs, Jackson invented the abbreviation “OKö to cover up his own
misspelling of “all correct.ö
The man responsible for unraveling the mystery behind “OKö was an
American linguist named Allen Walker Read. An English professor at
Columbia University, Read dispelled a host of erroneous theories on the
origins of “OK,ö ranging from the name of a popular Army biscuit (Orrin
Kendall) to the name of a Haitian port famed for its rum (Aux Cayes) to
the signature of a Choctaw chief named Old Keokuk. Whatever its origins,
“OKö has become one of the most ubiquitous terms in the world, and
certainly one of America’s greatest lingual exports.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KF5JRV@ICLOUD.COM
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