Tracie in Madison, Wisconsin, shares her childhood misunderstanding about the town of Random, the place where she assumed that all sweepstakes winners were chosen. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Chosen at Random”
Well, here’s something else that’ll make you do a double take when it comes to familiar words and phrases.
When an adult shares a term that they misunderstood when they were a kid.
Tracy Jo Colla in Madison, Wisconsin, wrote us to say that when her mom was growing up in the 1960s, she always assumed there must be some city called Random.
And that Random, wherever it was, was the home of all sweepstakes and contests.
And that’s, of course, because announcers were always talking about how the winners were going to be chosen at random.
Random Oklahoma, a great well-known city.
Yeah, random’s a weird word.
Originally in English, it referred to a great speed or force in motion, kind of a headlong rush, probably from an old French word that means to run faster, gallop, like on a horse.
