Would you like to add some colorful Westernisms to your vocabulary? Look no further than Thomas L. Clark’s new book, Western Lore and Language: A Dictionary for Enthusiasts of the American West:
Biscuit shooter – The camp cook for ranch operations (1890s).
Bizzing – Hanging on the rear of a moving vehicle on a snow-slick street (mainly central Utah, 1960s). Also called bumper-bumming.
Bog rider – A cowboy who must go out in the spring and pull cows out of the mud (1910s).
Brush monkey – In logging, the person who performs menial tasks (mainly California, 1950s).
Buckle bunny – A female rodeo groupie (1970s).
Cohab – A polygamist (1880s).
Dude – Related words: dudedom, dudeness, dudery, dudie, dudine, dudish, dudism (all 1880s).
Fernhopper – A logger in the Pacific Northwest (1950s).
Horse crippler – A species of cactus, Echinocactus texensis (1870s).
Slow elk – Cattle, especially those that have been stolen and slaughtered (1910).
Spillionaire – An Alaskan who got rich from the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster and clean-up (1989).
Reprinted courtesy of the University of Utah Press, from Thomas L. Clark: Western Lore and Language, A Dictionary for Enthusiasts of the American West (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1996). ISBN 0-87480-510-4. Cloth, $24.95. Copies may be ordered directly from the University of Utah Press, toll-free 800/773-6672, or fax orders to 801/581-3365.
*Jared Farmer
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline How to talk Western.
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