It’s common for Southern moms to promise their children a Yankee dime if they complete a chore. The thing is a Yankee dime is a motherly kiss — much less exciting than an actual dime. It’s a phrase that plays on Yankee thrift, and...
If someone’s “drunk as Cooter Brown,” they’re pretty darn intoxicated. The saying comes from the word cooter, meaning box turtle, and alludes to a turtle swimming around in its own drink. This is part of a complete episode...
The emphatic exclamation “from hell to breakfast” goes back to the Civil War. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “From Hell to Breakfast” Hello, you have A Way with Words. Hi there, this is Brad Davis calling...
I’ll be John Brown! and I’ll be John Browned! are mild oaths that go back to John Brown’s 1859 raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia. The abolitionist planned to arm enslaved people for revolt and was caught and hanged. Depending...
Todd in Dallas picked up you ain’t just whistling Dixie from the movie Clue, where it means “you’re not kidding” or “that’s no exaggeration.” The expression traces back to the catchy song first popularized in 1850s blackface minstrel shows, and the...
What’s the origin of the warning phrase down goes your shanty!? This bit of menacing slang pops up in letters written by Civil War soldiers. One wrote, “If I ever get a chance to draw sight on a rebel, down goes his shanty.” It has...