sepia saturday, don't take any wooden nickles

Walter, the Missour-ah boy,
who originated the phrase in our family

When I found some loose change in the couch cushions the other
day, it reminded me of a phrase WT likes to say. He got it from his
father, who got it from his father. I guess you could say it is an old
"Missour-ah" boys' saying. The kids used to think it was so funny;
right on par with "I'm going to see a man about a dog", which he
would tell them when he was going somewhere and didn't want to
take them along. I'll save that for another post. I digress. The
phrase in question today is this:

Don't take any wooden nickels.

First recorded in about 1915, this expression was originally a
warning from friends and relatives to country folk in the great
migration from rural areas to the big cities, at the turn of the
century. It was a humorous bit of advice, meaning "beware of
those city slickers". No real wooden nickels were ever
counterfeited. Ironically, the country boys were the ones who
possibly did succeed in passing off wooden objects as the real thing.
Yankee peddlers as early as 1825 allegedly sold wooden nutmegs,
which cost manufacturers a quarter of a cent each, mixed in with
lots of real nutmegs worth four cents each.

A second source says the expression means "don't let yourself be
cheated or ripped off". Originating in the United States, in the 1920s
and 1930s, money that had no real value was sometimes referred
to as "wooden". Stories about wooden nutmegs, wooden hams, and
wooden pumpkin seeds contributed to the later use of the phrase
"wooden nickels" in America, and even the use of wooden rubles in
Russia.

Another source adds that the United States minted five-cent pieces
from the earliest days of the Union, but they were not known as
nickels until 1866, when the first five-cent coins containing nickel
were minted. The practice of making commemorative tokens from
wood as centennial souvenirs developed, and we assume wooden
nickels actually were made during the nineteenth century for this
purpose. Frequently such coins were accepted as legal tender while
the celebration was in progress, but they ceased to have value
when the show was over. So, the expression "don't take any wooden
nickels" became the popular equivalent of "don't be a sucker".

So, hey, there you have it, my bloggy friends.

Have a great weekend, and don't go taking any wooden nickles.



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info from:
The Phrase Finder
Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins
by William and Mary Morris
Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins by Robert Hendrickson
Random House Dictionary of Popular Proverbs and Sayings by
Gregory Y. Titelman