I have a book that was written by my cousin Frances White and arranged by her daughter Jo Ann Congdon called Small Drops of Rain. In this book Frances recalls her life and memories of “…life during the early 1900’s on a poor Oklahoma Farm.” I have read this book a couple of times and even used some of chapters as blog posts. This week as I was looking through it again I came across the last page where Jo Ann says “My mother used many unique expression and repeated many odd sayings.” Then she listed each saying, and what they mean. The are too funny not to share.
- By Jangoes—same as By Gosh
- Blatherskite—–a blowhard, a pompous person, an unscrupulous person
- Up a stump—a perplexing situation, at wits end, a dilemma
- Up the Salt Creek—-a precarious position, in danger
- Shank’s Mare—-a foot, walking
- Devilling—Teasing or needling someone
- Pulling a leg—-Deceiving someone, fooling someone, a hoax
- Blow the whistle—to tattle or tell on someone
- Blabber Mouth—a gossip
- Shoot the Breeze—To visit casually, small talk
- Chew the Rag—about the same
- Chew the Fat—about the same
- Put on the Dog—to try to impress someone with your own importance
- Tighter than Dick’s Hatband—stingy or something tight
- Throw the Bull by the Tail—I wouldn’t trust him any further than I could throw a bull
- Skin—to cheat or take advantage
- More crooked than a barrel of snakes—said of a theif or a liar
- I doggies—same as by golly
- Gully washer—a very hard rain
- Sawing logs—snoring loudly
- What the sam hill?—What’s going on?
- Ding Fawd—A watcha may callit
- Cabbage on to it—to take; especially selfishly
- Cap the Climax—extraordinarily exciting, or over and abbe the ordinary
- Tearing up Jake—doing damage
- Bless your little body bones—terms of endearment to a child
- Run through a smartweed patch—someone who is condescending
- Tenkettle Tea—Sweetened hot water
- I haven’t seen hide nor hair of—when someone is looking for something or someone
- Laddie Buck—a guilty person
- Ornery rake—something or someone bad
- Work like a towhead—to work very hard
- Till the last dog is dead—To last until all is over
- Ornery as gar’s broth—a mean person
- That drotted thing—something aggravating
- Tear of a strip—to be angry and rant and rave
- Some Pumpkins—one who is egotistical, thinks they are better than someone else
- Conniption fit—about the same as tear off a strip(#36)
- Since Heck was a pup—something or someone not seen for a long time
- By hook or crook—by any means possible
- As mad as Tucker when his Daddy left him to all the corn plow—someone who is very angry.
I have heard of some of the sayings before so not all of them were new to me but many in the list I had never heard before. I would love to hear my ancestors visit with their neighbors and family to hear how they would use this expressions.
Ella Jane Anne 
I love this! I often think about expressions that have been passed down in my family and wonder how far back they started. There are terms of endearment that my maternal grandmother used, my mother still uses, and now I use (honey bunny, precious, etc.) and I wonder whether my great grandmother spoke to her children the same way. Or farther back? I’m sure there must be some linguistics study about this kind of thing, but wouldn’t it be cool to be able to trace in our own families? A new subcategory of genealogy–linguistic genetics?
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Thank yuh. I love the idea of that new subcategory.
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These are great, and give me an idea that I should do my own list of family expressions at some point. One of my favorites comes from my grandmother: “We’re off like a herd of turtles.” It would be fun to list all the ones I can remember.
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Thank you so much. I loved the list when I read it and knew I needed to share.
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So fun! Some of these sayings, I have heard before and some were new to me. Thanks for sharing.
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How cool! Some I’ve heard, others are new to me.
One saying handed down in our family…. if I was looking for something, say my shoe, I’d ask Mom and she would say “It’s up in Nellie’s room behind the clock!”. Of course I said the same thing to my kids.
Years later we were talking about it and I said I envisioned Nellie’s room upstairs, in the attic maybe, and my shoe was behind her clock, which must have been big to be hiding all my things! My kids all said they took it that the item was in Nellie’s room, which was behind the clock (we had a big old clock in our dining room). And who the heck is Nellie anyways??
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Love this. And it’s great you’ve written them here. Otherwise who will remember them? My one kid used to ask about ‘the man with the dog’. My dad when he didn’t want to answer all our questions about where he was going (and why we couldn’t go too) would answer that ‘he was going to see a man about a dog’, Maybe his dad said that! Drat! I never asked him. We never did get a dog (but my kids did).
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