The whole nine yards
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Print from 1907 in the Indiana/central-US belt. WWII ammo belts, concrete trucks, and kilts are back-formations.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/the-whole-nine-yards.html (opens in a new tab)
Spill the beans
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US print, Stevens Point Journal, June 1908. Greek voting-beans story has no trail into the American phrase.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/spill-the-beans.html (opens in a new tab)
Barking up the wrong tree
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
James Kirke Paulding, Westward Ho!, 1832. Coonhounds, not a later cartoon.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/barking-up-the-wrong-tree.html (opens in a new tab)
Let the cat out of the bag
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
English print by 1760. Market-fraud (pig in a poke) is a live candidate, not a closed case.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/let-the-cat-out-of-the-bag.html (opens in a new tab)
Beat around the bush
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Medieval bird-hunting: beaters flush game.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/beat-around-the-bush.html (opens in a new tab)
Kick the bucket
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
In Grose, 1785. Beam/yoke vs. hanging-bucket: neither case is closed.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/kick-the-bucket.html (opens in a new tab)
Bite the bullet
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Grose records a soldier biting a bullet during flogging. Kipling’s figurative “bite on the bullet” is later. Operating-table story is the usual retelling.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/bite-the-bullet.html (opens in a new tab)
Saved by the bell
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Boxing, 19th century. Victorian safety-coffin bells are a separate panic with no trail into the phrase.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/saved-by-the-bell.html (opens in a new tab)
Cut to the chase
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Hollywood silent-film editing. Script direction by 1929; figurative use in the 1940s.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/cut-to-the-chase.html (opens in a new tab)
Rule of thumb
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Practical measure by 1658. The “stick no thicker than a thumb” wife-beating story is a false etymology.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/rule-of-thumb.html (opens in a new tab)
The buck stops here
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Truman’s desk sign is the refusal of “pass the buck”; a colonel had such a sign by 1942. Poker origin: see Pass the buck.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/the-buck-stops-here.html (opens in a new tab)
The Nonsense Nine — popular folk etymologies
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Desk used for the Atlas “folk” tag: whole nine yards, raining cats and dogs, the real McCoy, and related campfire stories.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/nonsense-nine.html (opens in a new tab)
Caught red-handed
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Scottish “red hand,” Acts of Parliament of James I, 1432. Blood still on the hands.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/caught-red-handed.html (opens in a new tab)
Fly off the handle
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Thomas C. Haliburton, 1843–44. Loose axe-head. In-app origin now names Haliburton.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/fly-off-the-handle.html (opens in a new tab)
Once in a blue moon
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
English absurdity, then almanac extra-moon-in-a-season. The “second full moon in a calendar month” reading is James Pruett’s 1946 Sky & Telescope error.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/once-in-a-blue-moon.html (opens in a new tab)
Steal one's thunder
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Phrase Finder gives 1704 for John Dennis's Appius and Virginia and the thunder machine later used in Macbeth. That year is Liberty Asserted, at Lincoln's Inn Fields. Appius and Virginia was staged at Drury Lane in 1709.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/steal-ones-thunder.html (opens in a new tab)
Three sheets to the wind
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Sheets are ropes, not sails. Loose sheets let the sail luff and the ship stagger.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/three-sheets-to-the-wind.html (opens in a new tab)
Close, but no cigar
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US carnival cigars as prizes. Earliest print: Annie Oakley screenplay, 1935. Matches the carnival trail.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/close-but-no-cigar.html (opens in a new tab)
Mad as a hatter
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Mercury compounds in hat making caused real occupational disease. Earliest phrase print (1829/1835) does not explain millinery. Phrase Finder: coining of the English phrase is not a closed millinery case.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/mad-as-a-hatter.html (opens in a new tab)
Pass the buck
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Poker: a buckhorn marker for the dealer. Weekly New Mexican, 1865. Truman’s desk sign is the refusal.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/pass-the-buck.html (opens in a new tab)
Under the weather
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Nautical. Early print 1803, sailors’ slang for difficulty. The sick-bay “below deck” story is poorly supported. Origin line tightened.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/under-the-weather.html (opens in a new tab)
Paint the town red
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US print 1883 (New York Times). The phrase is often pinned on the 1837 Melton Mowbray riot, but it does not appear in print until decades later.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/paint-the-town-red.html (opens in a new tab)
Cold turkey
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US early 20th century, plain talk (1914) then narcotic withdrawal (1921).
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/cold-turkey.html (opens in a new tab)
In like Flynn
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
San Francisco Examiner 1942 (“your name is Flynn — you’re in”) before the Errol Flynn gloss. Ed Flynn is a later retrofit.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/in-like-flynn.html (opens in a new tab)
Heard it through the grapevine
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
“Grapevine telegraph,” in a US dictionary by 1852 and famous in the Civil War: unofficial, twisting. Matches the phrase trail. (The Motown song is later memory, not the origin.)
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/heard-it-through-the-grapevine.html (opens in a new tab)
The real McCoy
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Claimants include Mackay whisky, boxer Kid McCoy, and inventor Elijah McCoy. Phrase Finder: probably no McCoy in particular.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/real-mccoy.html (opens in a new tab)
Piece of cake
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
American print: Ogden Nash, Primrose Path, 1936. RAF-easy-job is not the trail this essay uses. In-app origin corrected.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/piece-of-cake.html (opens in a new tab)
Throw in the towel
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Boxing. Sponge first (1845); towel from the corner later (US sports pages, 1913).
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/throw-in-the-towel.html (opens in a new tab)
White elephant
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Holy, ruinously expensive elephants in Siam/Thailand. English idiomatic print 1851.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/white-elephant.html (opens in a new tab)
Straight from the horse's mouth
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Racing: a tip from those closest to the animal. Print 1896. Age-in-the-teeth is a related market fact, not this essay’s trail. In-app origin tightened.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/straight-from-the-horses-mouth.html (opens in a new tab)
Hold your horses
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US, 1844 New Orleans Picayune: “hold your hosses.” Atlas status: documented. Matches the 1840s American trail.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/184400.html (opens in a new tab)
A dime a dozen
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
American. Traders once advertised a dime a dozen as a bargain; figurative “commonplace” by 1931 (The Northern Miner). Matches 20th-century US use.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/a-dime-a-dozen (opens in a new tab)
Take with a grain of salt
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
John Trapp, 1647. Later readers tied it to Pliny’s poison recipe; Pliny did not write the English idiom.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/take-with-a-grain-of-salt.html (opens in a new tab)
Raining cats and dogs
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
English, 17th–18th century print. Thatched-roof animals and Norse weather gods are later decorations.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/raining-cats-and-dogs.html (opens in a new tab)
Till the cows come home
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
Print from 1593 (Eliot). Cows at their own unhurried pace. Evening milking is the usual picture, not the documented coining. Origin line tightened.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/till-the-cows-come-home.html (opens in a new tab)
On the wagon
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US, water-cart then water-wagon, early 1900s. Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch, 1901: “I’m on the water-cart.” Atlas status: documented. Matches the temperance water-wagon trail.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/on-the-wagon.html (opens in a new tab)
Bought the farm
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
US military, 20th century. Insurance-payout, crash-on-a-farm, and burial-plot stories compete. None is closed.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/bought-the-farm.html (opens in a new tab)
All hat and no cattle
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Idioms
American, later form of “big hat, no cattle.” Older form: Oklahoma News, February 1937. “All hat and no cattle” is a latter-20th-century form; the Kingsport Times, 1977, prints “big hat and no cattle” with a Texan gloss. Origin line tightened to the essay.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/all-hat-and-no-cattle.html (opens in a new tab)
The birds and the bees
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Euphemisms
Coy sex-ed talk for children. Origin uncertain. First print in a sex-education context: Charleston Gazette, November 1929. Coleridge (1825) and Cole Porter (1928) are atmosphere, not a closed coining.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/the-birds-and-the-bees.html (opens in a new tab)
Pass away
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Euphemisms
One of the oldest English death-euphemisms. Lay Folks Mass Book, circa 1400. Originally a literal picture of the soul’s departure after the rites. Origin line tightened to the essay.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/278400.html (opens in a new tab)
Visit the ladies' room
The Phrase Finder (Gary Martin) · n.d. · Euphemisms
Lavatory euphemisms: ladies’ room, powder room, cloakroom, facilities, WC. Ladies’ room began as a literal cloak room. Powder room is listed, not given a closed coining. The same essay lists restroom, john, little boys’/girls’ room, and comfort station as US toiletry euphemisms — not a closed coining for restroom.
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/399200.html (opens in a new tab)
History of US Circulating Coins
United States Mint · n.d. · Idioms
Spanish milled dollars were a colonial favorite. To make change, people sometimes cut the coin into halves, quarters, eighths, and sixteenths. The Coinage Act of 1792 set the US dollar to that Spanish milled dollar and its fractional parts. Matches the cutting-into-eighths trail; this page does not print the words “two bits.”
https://www.usmint.gov/learn/history/us-circulating-coins (opens in a new tab)
Proposed Issue of a Twenty-Cent Coin (1874)
United States Mint (Historical Reference Collection) · 1874 · Idioms
On the Pacific coast and in Texas the terms bits, two bits, and four bits applied to fractions of the Spanish dollar. A twenty-five-cent coin used to pay “one bit” returned a ten-cent piece, five cents lost — so two bits is the quarter. Not a Gary Martin essay.