PEARL HARBOR

PRONUNCIATION: (purl HAHR-buhr)

MEANING: noun: A sudden, devastating attack.
verb tr.: To attack suddenly with devastating results.

ETYMOLOGY: After Pearl Harbor, near Honolulu, Hawaii, the site of a US naval base, which was attacked by Japanese planes on Dec 7, 1941, leading to the US joining WWII. Earliest documented use: 1942.
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PEAR HARBOR - a port in the middle of orchard country

PERL HARBOR - a colony of dedicated list-processing computer programmers

PEARTH ARBOR - scheme to evade Australian copyright laws