A flashlight doesn’t flash. It provides a steady beam of light. So why is it called a flashlight? The earliest versions lit up only briefly before the batteries gave out and required a recharge, so they were literally “flash lights.” Years later, in 1916, Eveready flashlight company held a nationwide contest to coin a new word for the new, improved version. The winning entry?Daylo. Obviously, daylo didn’t catch on. The old word, flashlight, stuck around in the United States, while in the United Kingdom, this illumination aid was called an electric torch or later, simply a torch.This is part of a complete episode.
Susie Dent’s murder mystery Guilty by Definition (Bookshop|Amazon) follows a lexicographer in Oxford who becomes a sleuth of a different kind, seeking the culprit in a long-unsolved killing. A lexicographer herself, Dent includes lots of obscure and...
Mona from Riverview, Florida, grew up understanding that the word schmooze, which comes from Yiddish, meant simply “to mingle and chat” at parties, but when she fondly referred to her friend as a schmoozer, the friend was insulted, assuming that a...
