OK: The Improbable Story of America's Greatest Word

225 Pages·2010·1.02 MB·English

by  Allan Metcalf

OK
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OK
the improbable story of
america’s greatest word
Allan Metcalf

2011
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Copyright © 2011 by Allan Metcalf
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Metcalf, Allan A.
OK : the improbable story of America’s greatest word /
Allan Metcalf.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 978-0-19-537793-4
1. English language—United States—Etymology.
2. United States—History—Terminology.
3. English language—Usage. 4. Americanisms. I. Title.
PE2831.M48 2010
427′.973—dc21
2010009709
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
To the memory of
Allen Walker Read
who rules OK
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CONTENTS
Preface ix
1. I ntroduction: Th e ABCs of OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2. A Saturday Morning in Boston . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
3. 1 840: Old Kinderhook Is OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
4. H oax: Andrew Jackson’s Misspelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
5. Aesthetics: Th e Look and Sound of OK . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
6. False Origins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
7. Th e Business of OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
8. O .K. Clubs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
9. Th e Literary OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
10. O klahoma Is OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
11. O key-Dokey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
12. M odern OK Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
13. Th e Practical OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
14. Th e World—and England . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
15. Th e Lifemanship OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
16. Th e Psychological OK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
17. Th e American Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Index 199
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PREFACE
ok. why this book? strangely enough, even though
OK is by far the most successful American creation in language, as
well as nearly the strangest, it hasn’t had a book of its own. So here
it is.
And it is made possible, above all, by Allen Walker Read
(1906–2002), professor at Columbia University, scholar without
equal of American English. Before he came along, a century of
speculation, obfuscation, and deliberate deception had obscured
the origin of OK seemingly beyond recovery. In the absence of any
clear evidence and the presence of false rumors, learned lexicogra-
phers as well as ordinary citizens were free to imagine the begin-
nings of OK in sources as disparate as the Choctaw Indian
language, Otto Kimmel’s biscuits, and supposed misspelling by