Date:    Sun, 22 Feb 1998 14:41:51 EST
<br>From:    "Barry A. Popik"  Bapopik[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]AOL.COM 
<br>Subject: Sky line; Ragged edge; Muckers; Psycho; Yellow dog
<br>
<br>SKY LINE
<br>
<br>     Barnhart's Dictionary of Etymology has "skyline (1824, line where earth
<br>and sky meet, horizon; 1896, outline of buildings against the sky, in writings
<br>of George Bernard Shaw)."
<br>     We can beat the latter by over two decades.  In fact, "sky line" appears
<br>before the first "sky scraper" building.  This is from the New York Commercial
<br>Advertiser, 27 February 1875, pg. 1, col. 2:
<br>
<br>     New York's Sky Line.
<br>     In an interesting letter to the Boston _Advertiser_, from an occasional
<br>correspondent in this City, we find the following:  "Absolute flatness could
<br>never be predicated of Manhattan Island.  The City Hall Park is not less than
<br>thirty feet above tide water; and Broadway, as every omnibus horse knows to
<br>his cost, is an undulatory and even sharply hilly thoroughfare.  One ascends
<br>gradually from the Battery, abruptly (going in the opposite direction) from
<br>Canal street; and the ferries on both rivers land their passengers at the foot
<br>of a considerable incline.  The plateau thus bounded has till of late years
<br>had a uniform outline, much as described by Baron Hubner.  Formerly, in order
<br>to obtain a characteristic view of the City, it was deemed necessary to
<br>approach it from the lower bay--or "end on," as we might express it.  In the
<br>geographies in vogue a quarter of a century ago (in Woodbridge's, for example,
<br>as I remember it), we were shown the round fort on Governor's Island, the
<br>Battery, and Trinity Church; that was New York looking north.  Now an artist
<br>or a photographer would plant himself rather on the Jersey or the Long Island
<br>shore, preferring the panoramic to the perspective view.  In place of a line
<br>rising from the water's edge to Trinity Church, and thence substantially
<br>horizontal till the clock-tower of the City Hall was reached, one now sees
<br>(say from Hoboken) first the square mass of Babbitt's soap factory; next
<br>Trinity; then the Equitable and Mutual Life Buildings; then the roof of the
<br>Delaware and Hudson Canal Company's Office; then the Western Union Telegraph
<br>Company's mammoth edifice; then in the huddle, the _Evening Post_, Park Bank
<br>and _Herald_ Buildings, pierced by the spire of St. Paul's, then the Post
<br>Office, the tower and high roof of the _Tribune_ Building, the twin piers of
<br>the Brooklyn Bridge, and finally City Hall.  From this point Northward the
<br>line becomes tolerably even again, but is broken at short intervals by spires,
<br>pavilions and domes, more numerous than striking, till the City vista is cut
<br>off by the factory-like Manhattan Market, and the eye rests delightedly on the
<br>natural shapes of the unharvested cliffs of the Hudson.
<br>
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<br>RAGGED EDGE
<br>
<br>     I previously said that the Beecher-Tilton affair was called "the ragged
<br>edge trial."
<br>     "Ragged edge" was also in the Cincinnati Daily Gazette, 20 March 1875,
<br>pg. 7, col. 6, "INSURANCE/  ANOTHER COMPANY ON THE RAGGED EDGE!"  In the same
<br>publication, 17 March 1875, pg. 4, col. 1, "The 'ragged-edge' men in
<br>Cincinnati just now are the members of the Johnston Democracy."  The New-York
<br>Commercial Advertiser, 27 April 1875, pg. 2, col. 3, has "matters are still on
<br>the 'r-gg-d edge.'"
<br>
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<br>MUCKERS
<br>
<br>     This possible antedate (see the RHHDAS) is from the Cincinnati Daily
<br>Gazette, 22 January 1875, pg. 4, col. 1:
<br>
<br>     What is BISMARCK about?  Does he think that the German fatherland extends
<br>across the Atlantic, and is he about to interpose diplomatic remonstrances, or
<br>adopt even sterner policy against Puritanic "muckers?"
<br>
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<br>PSYCHO
<br>
<br>     Barnhart's Dictionary of Etymology has 1927 for "psycho."  But perhaps
<br>the first "psycho" was not a person at all!
<br>     This is from the Cincinnati Daily Gazette, 12 February 1875, pg. 4, col.
<br>5:
<br>
<br>     The Automaton Card Player.
<br> From the London Times.
<br>     The new automaton invented by Mr. John Neuil Maskelyne and Mr. John
<br>Algernon Clarke, which appears twice daily in Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke's
<br>entertainment at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, is not a deception like Baron
<br>Kempler's renowned chess player.  (...)  The marvel of the new invention of
<br>Mr. Maskelyne and Mr. Clarke consists in three distinctive features--the
<br>figure has no living being within it; it is perfectly isolated from any
<br>connection--mechanical, electrical, magnetical, or otherwise conceivable--with
<br>any operator at a distance; and yet, nevertheless, it plays a game of whist
<br>with no little skill, performs arithmetical calculations, obeys by its
<br>movements the directions of any person in the audience, and accomplishes a
<br>number of very surprising feats with cards chosen and names written by the
<br>audience.  "Psycho," as the automaton has been named,...
<br>
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<br>YELLOW DOG
<br>
<br>     Sure, I'd trust a yellow dog.  This is from the New York Tribune, 9
<br>February 1875, pg. 6, col. 6:
<br>
<br>     A "yaller" dog has covered himself with glory as a traveler or pilgrim or
<br>quadrupedestrian.  He was taken last Fall from Indiana to Kansas.  But he
<br>didn't like Kansas, and was homesick through and through.  He found meat
<br>scarce and was averse to a diet of grasshoppers.  So he tramped it over miles
<br>and miles of desolate prairies; he swam the Kansas and Missouri Rivers; and
<br>one day, footsore, weary, and lean, he barked at the old door.  He was six
<br>weeks upon the journey; and the first thing he did upon getting home was to
<br>eat his dinner calmly, the next to drive the pigs out of the yard according to
<br>his ancient custom.  He had learned something, but had forgotten nothing.  If
<br>ever dog deserved a silver collar and unlimited bones for life, he is the
<br>animal.
<br>
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<br>PERSONAL
<br>
<br>     At a chapter of SABR (Society for American Baseball Research) on
<br>Saturday, February 28th, 3:25-3:40 p.m., at the Brooklyn Heights Library, I'll
<br>lecture on the origin of "New York Yankees," "Bronx Bombers," and "Subway
<br>Series."  Most everything has already been posted here.  I did the origin of
<br>the "fan" at the SABR meeting in 1996.  About 130 people show up.  I'll also
<br>write it in article form for Yankees Magazine.
<br>     From March 5-20th I'll be in Guatemala (no internet!), touring the Mayan
<br>sites and investigating the origin of "chocolate."  There is a safety risk,
<br>and it was a tough choice between being robbed in Guatemala or dying from
<br>anthrax poisoning on the New York City subways.
<br>