Terms Which Have Disappeared

[vitanola]

I dearly love the New Yorker of the '30s and '40s for its perception of New York itself as a gigantic quirky small town filled with clever witty people doing clever witty things. The current New Yorker has its good points, but that whole Dorothy Parker/Harold Ross/James Thurberish New Yorker is gone forever. Where you used to find archness, now there's just empty snark.

For that matter, to pull out a copy of The New Yorker from the Era and a copy of Bernarr Macfadden's "Liberty" from the same year, and to compare them, is to understand more about the real nature of the America of the Era than you will ever ever learn from any historian.

When I was seven I found a copy of the 25th anniversary collection of New Yorker cartoons. I loved that book. It informed my reading for years. I was particularly fond of Richard Taylor's stuff : "A revised statuary for the City of Tomorrow", "Our Modern Gallery of Ancient Favorites", "Oh, THAT'S Herbert's Muse", and "Practically all my calls come from the "National Geographic" all still make me smile.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Now that you mention it, I do remember reading the most inane and slanted tripe in that particular rag. I was about 14 when I figured out that they had their own philosophical ax to grind and that objectivity was not to be presumed..

The biggest mistake anyone can make is to presume that objectivity has ever existed on America's magazine racks. There were no "objective" magazines on the stands in the Era -- every publication you could buy had a slant, and that slant was usually readily perceptible. The vast majority of the "slick magazines" slanted rather heavily to the right -- some were less aggressive about it than others, but nonetheless the slant was there. The few that didn't tilt right tended to be "moderate" in a way that was designed to be as inoffensive to the right as possible.

The only unapologetically left-leaning magazines of the Era tended to be pulp-paper "opinion journals" ranging from The Nation on the New Deal left to New Masses on the radical left. Look started out with a leftward tilt when it began as an ad-free biweekly, but as soon as it started taking advertising it skittered rightward. It wasn't as far right as Life until after the war, but it certainly wasn't lefty anymore. A subsequent left-oriented weekly picture magazine, "Friday," ran with modertate success for a couple of years in the early forties, as did a left-oriented digest magazine called "Magazine Digest," but they had trouble getting wide distribution. Magazine distribution was controlled in the Era across most of the country by organized crime, and there were those in a position to make substantial payoffs to these distributors to ensure that publications with an unacceptable viewpoint somehow didn't get the level of service that, say, the Reader's Digest might get.

 

[BlueTrain]

Although I mentioned that there seem to be more magazines published now than ever before, there sure aren't as many places to buy them as there used to be. But maybe I just don't go into the city as much as I used to.

One magazine that is sometimes very interesting in a quirky way is The Backwoodsman. The title says it all. It tries really hard to be conservative but it's really just reactionary. It's readers should fit right in here, being backwards-oriented (no offense to anyone--I'm here, after all), but rather more rural in nature. It's not quite a back to nature or survivalist in outlook but close. I figure the average age of readers must be past 50.

I recall that when Carter was running against Ford, there was a political cartoon of the two on magazine covers. Carter had been interviewed in Playboy, and he was pictured as being on the cover (I think). Gerald Ford was on the cover of Collier's, which by then hadn't been published for something like 20 years.

 

[Just Jim]

One term I've not seen or heard lately is "seen the elephant and heard the owl". Even among historical re-enactors, you seldom hear more than the first part. The last time I heard it was in the '80s, and then from a WWI vet.

 

[tonyb]

One term I've not seen or heard lately is "seen the elephant and heard the owl". Even among historical re-enactors, you seldom hear more than the first part. The last time I heard it was in the '80s, and then from a WWI vet.

Lovely expression. I can't say where or when I might I have heard it, though, and was left to guess its meaning. Cursory research suggests that the first part of it -- the elephant part -- might have a somewhat different meaning standing on its own than when it is joined by the second -- the bit about the owl.

 

[Just Jim]

Lovely expression. I can't say where or when I might I have heard it, though, and was left to guess its meaning. Cursory research indicates that the first part of it -- the elephant part -- might have a somewhat different meaning standing on its own than when it is joined by the second -- the bit about the owl.

Sorry, I should have explained it.

To "see the elephant" came from the days when to actually see an elephant was to see a wonder, and nothing was ever quite as wondrous again. By the time of the Civil War, to "see the elephant" had come to mean to face someone trying to kill you, most often in combat, and acquitting oneself in an acceptable manner.

To "hear the owl" is the flip side of that. It refers to the way seeing the elephant can change someone: reactions such as second-guessing, shame, guilt, all wrapped up with the understandable satisfaction or even pride at having survived. Not necessarily something like PTSD, but acknowledging that facing death can change you.

 

[BlueTrain]

I've read the expression "the owl called your name," but with no mention of the elephant. I think in the context it was written (where I read it), it had nothing to do with combat or such stuff but merely about death. I occasionally see an owl in the woods and they pay close attention to you and they do call out now and then, which is why I notice them. But they don't seem to know my name.

 

[tonyb]

Sorry, I should have explained it.

To "see the elephant" came from the days when to actually see an elephant was to see a wonder, and nothing was ever quite as wondrous again. By the time of the Civil War, to "see the elephant" had come to mean to face someone trying to kill you, most often in combat, and acquitting oneself in an acceptable manner.

To "hear the owl" is the flip side of that. It refers to the way seeing the elephant can change someone: reactions such as second-guessing, shame, guilt, all wrapped up with the understandable satisfaction or even pride at having survived. Not necessarily something like PTSD, but acknowledging that facing death can change you.

No need to apologize. I looked it up, which I've found to be the more reliable way to commit a matter to memory.

My reading has me thinking that the meaning changed over time, that it once meant to witness a rare and wondrous thing, usually at some extraordinary expense and/or difficulty, but that it came to mean something no less wondrous but considerably less sunny during and after the Civil War. The "hear the owl" bit appears to be an abbreviation of "hear the owl call your name," which is (or was) an omen, a metaphor for pending doom.

No real surprise that few of us are familiar with the expression. If the sources are to be trusted, it came into use in our fair land late in the 18th or early in the 19th century and had fallen by the wayside by the early 20th century. That WWI vet you referenced would have been of the last generation to have used the expression in everyday speech.

 

[scottyrocks]

It was advertised on TV for many years by Jane Russell, who evidentlly had given up on the Howard Hughes cantilever model by then.

I understand that Frank Lloyd Wright was also working on a version.

 

[BlueTrain]

These days, you hear the expression, "Been there, done that, got the t-shirt." It just doesn't carry the seriousness that older expressions had. It says, "I'm bored."

 

[Upgrade]

What goes around comes around.

The floppy disk still hangs around as the save button. The 3.5” version is more accurately called a diskette since the original floppy disks were huge and went up to 8 inches.

The Impossible Project managed to recreate the film for the Polaroid camera, with sustained interest in the format leading to an almost affordable price.

The motion picture industry still likes to throw around “film” either for the panache or the fact that it has only one syllable.

Vinyl records are said to be experiencing a resurgence, though 78s seem to have been left out. Record Store Day is spinning off with Cassette Store Day with new releases under the format.

Now we just wait to see if 8 tracks, CEDs, VHS, and LaserDiscs can still be made.

 

[3fingers]

I was not aware of the renaissance of the Polaroid camera until the soon to be wife of one of our boys showed me hers. There are 2 versions. One that takes pictures like the last series of Polaroids that spit them out the front and a digital version that takes oversized photo booth pictures. I had to smile at her enthusiasm about her "new" camera. I remember B&W Polaroid photos that you had to rub the stinky sponge across after you peeled the paper off of it.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That type of film is also still available -- I'm looking into getting some 4x5 sheets of it to shoot with my Speed Graphic, which came equipped with a Polaroid film holder.

 

[Bugguy]

Came up behind a fellow at a stoplight and when it turned green he just sat there. My dad would say "What are you dong, waiting for a color you like?"

 

[tonyb]

Came up behind a fellow at a stoplight and when it turned green he just sat there. My dad would say "What are you dong, waiting for a color you like?"

Or, as the Southern relatives put it, "if it gets any greener, it will grow."'

 

[BlueTrain]

My son who works in Hollywood informs me that film is still used in motion picture production, even if the final result is converted to digital something or other. That's not to say it's always used but it hasn't disappeared by any means.

I worked in amateur photofinishing for almost twenty years and as an industry, it has all but disappeared. One company I worked for at one time had upwards of twenty plants around the country, all employing over 100 people each. While you might think it was digital cameras and cell phones that killed the industry, it was already beginning when minilabs started to become common. And I think they're all still there, mostly in drug stores. You can still get prints made but you don't need film. You don't even have to take something in to the store for processing.

So a number of commercial terms have disappeared, like pocket camera, Instamatic, box camera, film cartridge and so on. I don't even know if slides are still produced.

On a totally different subject, I was reminded last night as I was slicing bread, how we used to say "the greatest thing since sliced bread. How long has sliced bread been around? I don't remember it otherwise but I do remember when it came fully covered without a clear plastic wrapping.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Pre-sliced store bread goes back to 1928, but it didn't become a national proposition until Continental Baking introduced "Wonder-Cut" bread in 1930.

Continental pushed it heavily on its radio program featuring the "Happy Wonder Bakers," and within a very few years sliced bread dominated the market. It was banned briefly in 1943 due to the extra wrapping it required, but complaints forced the OPA to rescind the ban. Wartime Americans were willing to give up a lot to beat Hitler, but not, by god, their sliced bread.

 

[tonyb]

Back in the late '90s/early Aughts I was acquainted with a couple who took over a local camera shop where they had worked for a number of years prior. Their big money maker was the mini photo lab they installed.

You know how this story ends.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

On a totally different subject, I was reminded last night as I was slicing bread, how we used to say "the greatest thing since sliced bread. How long has sliced bread been around? I don't remember it otherwise but I do remember when it came fully covered without a clear plastic wrapping.

Betty White is older then sliced bread.

 

[ChrisB]

Just used "shenanigans" in another thread - it seems to be disappearing.

The term itself may be disappearing, but not what it refers to.