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From: gmf@uvacs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.jokes.d
Subject: Word Origins (O.K.)
Message-ID: <1553@uvacs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 3-Oct-84 03:33:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: uvacs.1553
Posted: Wed Oct  3 03:33:54 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 4-Oct-84 06:00:27 EDT
Lines: 36



O.K., I can't resist any longer.

>From Eric Partridge's  Origins  (copyright 1958-1966):

    O.K. is prob not, as formerly believed from Choctaw  oke ,
    var  hoke , meaning 'Yes, it is', but perh rather (as proposed by
    Allan Walker Read) from the banners of the  O.K.  Club, the
    Democratic party's political club of 1840: app for  Old Kinderhook ,
    the nickname of Martin van Buren (president of the U.S.A. in 1837-41),
    whose birthplace was  Kinderhook  in the State of New York.

(The abbreviations are Partridge's).  O.K.?

    On the other hand, one of my dictionaries (Webster's New World,
2nd College Edn, Simon & Schuster, copyright 1970-1982) manages to
have it two ways  It says first known use is 1839 "as if abbrev. for
"oll korrect," facetious misspelling of  all correct ", and then goes
on to say it was "popularized by use in name of Democratic O.K. Club
(1840), in allusion to  Old Kinderhook , native village of Martin
Van Buren ..."


    And then there's Brewer's Dictionary (revised by Ivor Evans, copyright
1981).  After mentioning that O.K. is "commonly regarded as standing
for "Orl [not oll this time] Korrect" ", the authors seem to favor the
Van Buren "Old Kinderhook" explanation, and then add:

    Another suggestion is that it derives from the Wolof language
    of former West African slaves in which  waw kay  signified "all
    right, certainly".

    So there.  Brewer has cried Wolof.

               Gordon Fisher