some pumpkins:

(dedicated to the one-year anniversary celebration of one milum, since this phrase may have survived in some places as something of a Southernism...and is apt to the gentleman in question)

Here, now, belatedly, is the second installment of my "Bring "Em Back Alive!" series of obsolete (or semi-obsolete) 19th Century words and phrases I am on a mission to revive in usage, 'cause I like 'em! This now takes its place next to absquatulate and kerfuffle (thank ya kindly, sjm) in the Resurrectionist Lexicon! (Rhuby, are you with me on this one?) And since there's also a Kentucky connection here, one can't help but see how it was tailor-made for a certain friend...'cause, that Jackie, she's some pumpkins!

from The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in the 1800's by Marc McCutcheon:

some pumpkins: someone or something impressive

1846: One of them thinks he's got a scrub [horse] that's some pumpkins.
--A Quarter Race in Kentucky, p. 118

1851: We went on until the third or fourth set, and I thought I was some pumpkins at dancing.
--An Arkansas Doctor, p. 97

1853: "Got a smart chunk of pony thar." "Yes, Sir, he is some pumpkins sure; offered ten cows and claves for him; he's death on a quarter."
--Paxton, A Stray Yankee in Texas, p.44

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! The Pumpkinification of milum!!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! The Pumpkinification of milum!!

Hey, hey, tsuwm...this is Q&A. I know I laced my post with some humor, but this is a serious word post...just like absquatulate and kerfuffle! Please show more respect.

but juan, my post too was only *laced with humor -- pumpkinification is a serious word, coined by Robert *Graves no less. (whereas 'some pumpkins' is merely a phrase..)

but juan, my post too was only *laced with humor -- pumpkinification is a serious word, coined by Robert *Graves no less. (whereas 'some pumpkins' is merely a phrase..)

Hmmmm. I'd say that makes it a pretty grave word then...okay, we're back on track here...just wanted to make sure we weren't undergoing the tsuwmification of something special, here.

Thank you, Dearest. Maybe the phrase originated because of pumpkin-growing contests?

Maybe the phrase originated because of pumpkin-growing contests?

Seems we have a real mystery here, folks...I searched Quinion, Bartleby, The Phrase Finder, and OneLook for some pumpkins...nada! Usually there's some citation of a known phrase. And I know I've heard it years before I encountered it in my 19th Century historical interpretation studies. Jackie's offering seems a likely source. Anyone have a clue to the origin for this one? And why no dictionary listings?

coined by Robert *Graves no less

Graves? I don't think so. B&M OED gives 1856 for the first citation. It's a translation of Seneca's word apocolocyntosis from his tribute to the god Claudius upon his death, APOCOLOCYNTOSIS DIVI CLAVDII. And *he got it from the Greek apokolokyntosis, transformation into a pumpkin. Ain't *that some pumpkins!

http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/sen.apoc.html

from the Greek apokolokyntosis, transformation into a pumpkin

Wow.

But what would the word be for a Cinderellesque transformation from a pumpkin?

But what would the word be for a Cinderellesque transformation from a pumpkin?
Depumpkination?

Graves? I don't think so.

Oh, be fair, Faldage. Graves may not have *coined the word, but it was he who made it current *currency (if anyone did).

>It's a translation of Seneca's word apocolocyntosis...

whose translation was that? thanks ASp!

whose translation was that?

Beats me. Graves was born in 1895 which would make him a little too young in 1856 to be translating Seneca. But then I think water is wet, so what do I know?

Time back way back during the bad time when one's duty section had duty the next day, overnight liberty (commonly known to the civilian as shore leave) expired at midnight rather than at the normal 0800 or whenever it was. This was referred to as Cinderella liberty and one spoke of oneself as "turning into a pumpkin".

Nice wwftd, tsuwm ~ and here's an emoticon for ya

Yeah, that wwftd, today, was some pumpkins! And then some!

are found in Roger Whitaker's chambers.

When my kids were ;in 4H, they all raised pumpkins. They even tried a Japanese developed
plant hormone, the name of which I now forget. But they never got really big ones, such as:

"The world-record pumpkin is a 1,061 pounder --
raised in Lowville, N.Y., last year. As the first
winner to achieve 1,000 pounds, it won a $50,000
prize from the World Pumpkin Confederation, of
Collins, N.Y. The organization is offering another
$50,000 to the person who raises the first
1,500-pound pumpkin."

Not even the Peanuts comic strip Giant Pumpkin got that big!

I finally found some citations for some pumpkins other than my quoted source, Dr. Bill!...but putting "some pumpkins slang" into the search. Here's one from Bartleby, an excerpt from H. L. Mencken's The American langauge (don't know why this didn't come up on the Bartleby site search:

>Thornton, in 1912, substituted the following:


Forms of speech now obsolete or provincial in England, which survive in the United States, such as allow, bureau, fall, gotten, guess, likely, professor, shoat.
Words and phrases of distinctly American origin, such as belittle, lengthy, lightning-rod, to darken one’s doors, to bark up the wrong tree, to come out at the little end of the horn, blind tiger, cold snap, gay Quaker, gone coon, long sauce, pay dirt, small potatoes, some pumpkins.
Nouns which indicate quadrupeds, birds, trees, articles of food, etc., that are distinctively American, such as ground-hog, hang-bird, hominy, live-oak, locust, opossum, persimmon, pone, succotash, wampum, wigwam.
Names of persons and classes of persons, and of places, such as Buckeye, Cracker, Greaser, Hoosier, Old Bullion, Old Hickory, the Little Giant, Dixie, Gotham, the Bay State, the Monumental City.
Words which have assumed a new meaning, such as card, clever, fork, help, penny, plunder, raise, rock, sack, ticket, windfall.<

Here's the whole page from Bartleby.
http://www.bartleby.com/185/pages/page41.html

This from Louisa May Alcott's Little Women:

MEG : Amy, what have you been doing?
AMY : Don't laugh, Jo. I only changed the little bottle of cologne for a big one. I gave all of my money to get it.
BETH : Amy!
MEG : Darling! That was unselfish of you.
JO : You're some pumpkins, Amy.
AMY : I felt ashamed thinking only of myself.

And this from a Mexican War journal by one George F. Ruxton (in Spanish..consuelo or anyone?):

Uno suele encontrarse con criaturas muy hermosas y cuando una mujer mexicana combina tales perfecciones, son «como calabazas», «some pumpkins», como dicen los habitantes de Missouri cuando se refieren a algo superlativo, cuando hablan de mujeres.

http://sunsite.unam.mx/revistas/1847/Ruxton-i.html

There were still more pages of hits I didn't have time to scour, Dr. Bill, if you want to try finding some more.

In reply to:

---

Uno suele encontrarse con criaturas muy hermosas y cuando una mujer mexicana combina tales perfecciones, son «como calabazas», «some pumpkins», como dicen los habitantes de Missouri cuando se refieren a algo superlativo, cuando hablan de mujeres.

---

One sometimes finds oneself in the company of these beautiful creatures [women], and when a Mexican woman exibits these perfections she is "some pumpkins" as they say in Missouri when speaking of things superlative, especially women

Interesting, Juan, to note the (Mexican) Spanish word for pumpkins is calabazas. There is, of course, a cognate word in English, calabash.

As many of us oldsters recall, Jimmy Durante always closed a show with the line, "and good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are." Although it was widely assumed that this referred to his late wife, no one really know who Mrs. Calabash was (he never explained). Does this give us any clues?

As many of us oldsters recall, Jimmy Durante always closed a show with the line, "and good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are." Although it was widely assumed that this referred to his late wife, no one really know who Mrs. Calabash was (he never explained). Does this give us any clues?

Here's a site which addresses this question, Boby. The link courtesy of Dr. Bill from another time when this was discussed:

http://www.skypoint.com/members/schutz19/durante.htm

"...wherever you are."

The legend as I heard it a long day ago was that Mrs. Calabash was the boarding-house landlady when Durante and his buddies were struggling young actors, and although they were habitually in arrears she didn't throw them out. When Durante made it big he made it a point to thank her publicly for it in this fashion, and then when she died he added "...wherever you are" to the benediction.

The buddies, btw, were named Clayton and Jackson, and the act was known as "Clayton, Jackson, and Durante." Durante was the only real success, and he made it a point to take care of his old partners. (That's in case you're wondering why, now that you think of it, that highly inferior old comic Eddie Jackson always appeared on The Jimmy Durante Show once a year...)

Thanks Good Folk for resurrecting happy memories of Jimmy Durante. And thanks whitman for resurrecting dr. bill's post with the URL featuring the Durante smile. I had forgotten the joy that that face brought into my young life.
He was "some pumkins".

Good night, Mr. Durante, we all know where you are.

Jimmy Durante

You're so right, milum! I loved that guy...the love and sparkle he exuded from the stage was rare gift indeed!
And he even coined a phrase that became part of the language, usually said after getting a big laugh: I got a million of em! I'll always miss him. Shame he had to spend so long a period at the end of his life crippled horribly from some debilitating disease...doesn't seem fair for all the joy he gave folks, but.

I got a million of em!

(very tentatively) why does that line make me think of Milton Berle?

(very tentatively) why does that line make me think of Milton Berle?

"Cause he stole it from the Ol' Schnozzola (Durante)! Not uncommon on the comedy circuit!