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<div><font color="#000000">For those of you at today's meeting, a bit
more on the "row to hoe" vs "road to hoe"
question.</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font
color="#000000">http://www.picturehistory.com/product/id/11917</font></div
>
<div>Looks like "A Hard Road" was used in the 1840
presidential campaign.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<div><font
color="#000000"
>http://www.puttingdownroots.net/columns/2000/cominguproses.htm</font></div
>
<div>Then again, Davy Crockett seems to have coined "Hard Row"
five years before that:</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><font color="#000000">"In 1835, David Crockett is quoted as
saying "I never opposed Andrew Jackson for the sake of
popularity. I knew it was a hard row to hoe; but I stood up to the
rack."</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">What rack? Not sure, but according
to</font> Bartlett's Dictionary of Americanisms (<font
color="#000000">http://www.merrycoz.org/voices/bartlett/AMER12.HTM</font
>):</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><font color="#000000">TO STAND UP TO THE RACK. A metaphorical
expression of the same meaning as the like choice phrases, 'to come to
the scratch;' 'to toe the mark.'</font></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>To conclude, by way of James Fenimore Cooper (<font
face="Lucida Grande" size="-4"
color="#000000">http://www.fullbooks.com/Oak-Openings6.html</font>):
"<font face="Lucida Grande" size="-4" color="#000000">The English
used to boast that the Americans wouldn't 'stand up to the rack,' if
the baggonet was set to work; 'but this was before we got our own
toothpicks,' said the old man.</font></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>I don't know about you, but I've got my own toothpick. And I'm
using it to hoe my row/road.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Cheers,</div>
<div>Robyn</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
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<div><br>
Robyn Fizz<br>
News Coordinator<br>
MIT Information Services and Technology (IS&T)<br>
N42-290B<br>
Phone: 617 253-0540<br>
Fax: 617 258-6875</div>
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