We have books for language-lovers and recommendations for history buffs. • How did the word boondoggle come to denote a wasteful project? The answer involves the Boy Scouts, a baby, a craft project, and a city council meeting. • Instead of reversing...
Anastasia in Marquette, Michigan, is reading a lot of Russian literature from the late 18th and early 19th century, and keeps getting confused by naming conventions in that language. That naming system is often a challenge for non-Russian speakers...
A listener in Richardson, Texas, notes that before her mother married, her middle name was Knight and her last name was Chevallier. For those who know the French word for “knight,” chevalier, this made for some occasional chuckles. This...
Hannah from Shreveport, Louisiana, is curious about Cooter Brown, a name she’s often heard applied to someone behaving mischievously. Cooter Brown shows up in several expressions, including drunk as Cooter Brown, high as Cooter Brown, and fast...
In the Tlingit & Haida cultures, there are many stories involving the kushtaka (also spelled kooshdakhaa, kushtahkah, and kooshdaa kaa, and stressed on the final syllable), a being associated with the land otter. The name shows up in several...
In the early 1600s, the term undertaker didn’t necessarily denote someone in charge of arranging funerals. It was a more general term referring to entrepreneurs who undertook the work of running a business. Mine undertakers undertook exploring...