jjares reviewed Whiffletrees and Goobers: 1,001 Fun and Fabulous Forgotten Words and Phrases on + 3493 more book reviews
As the lover of arcane, antique, and under-used words, I was delighted to sink into this book's covers. This book is a delightful introduction to the arcane through the drawings and the excellent descriptions.
Not everyone is excited about the English language's items left behind. A practical use for this book is for anyone writing about olden times. Writers are always looking for ways to add a sense of reality to their novels. This book specializes in antique car companies, farm implements, children's games, kitchen tools, measurements, and the oils and lamps used before electricity.
If you are wondering what a goober is, it is a colloquial term for a peanut. Other words from this book for a peanut are pindar, groundnut, and ground pea. Whiffletree is a bit harder to explain, but generally, it is a term related to horses. A whiffletree is a mechanism to distribute force evenly through linkages. It is an equalizer, leader bar, or double tree. Fortunately, many terms have a drawing that helps explain the word. The whiffletree is used with multiple horses to balance the pulling between the animals. Some horses may be more robust, allowing the farmer to balance the load.
Because of my age (I'm 70+), I was familiar with many of the words. However, this was a trip down memory lane. I remember a friend's father's business, repairing shoes, and watching her father at his shoe last (a foot-shaped piece of iron mounted upside down on a pedestal. The repairman used his shoe last to renail the sole to the shoe. This book is pure nostalgia. But authors could use this to add an air of reality to their descriptions of items used long ago.
Not everyone is excited about the English language's items left behind. A practical use for this book is for anyone writing about olden times. Writers are always looking for ways to add a sense of reality to their novels. This book specializes in antique car companies, farm implements, children's games, kitchen tools, measurements, and the oils and lamps used before electricity.
If you are wondering what a goober is, it is a colloquial term for a peanut. Other words from this book for a peanut are pindar, groundnut, and ground pea. Whiffletree is a bit harder to explain, but generally, it is a term related to horses. A whiffletree is a mechanism to distribute force evenly through linkages. It is an equalizer, leader bar, or double tree. Fortunately, many terms have a drawing that helps explain the word. The whiffletree is used with multiple horses to balance the pulling between the animals. Some horses may be more robust, allowing the farmer to balance the load.
Because of my age (I'm 70+), I was familiar with many of the words. However, this was a trip down memory lane. I remember a friend's father's business, repairing shoes, and watching her father at his shoe last (a foot-shaped piece of iron mounted upside down on a pedestal. The repairman used his shoe last to renail the sole to the shoe. This book is pure nostalgia. But authors could use this to add an air of reality to their descriptions of items used long ago.
