who laid the rail
adv. phr.— «They always had a celebration every year when I was a kid. And us kids looked forward to that. For we could shoot fire crackers till who laid the rail.» —in University of Illinois at Springfield Oral History Collection D618. Dinsmore, R.T. (Robert Truman) Interview and Memoir (Iowa) , 1979. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Debbie from Keokuk, Iowa, shares a funny story about her family’s tradition of speed-cleaning the house if guests were coming over. Her mother would declare, “Quick, guys! Whited sepulchre approach!” Her use of the term whited...
A psychiatric home health worker is curious about the use of nuthouse to mean “a mental health facility.” This term goes back to the turn of the 20th century. The word nuts itself once had an extremely positive connotation, referring to...