Was there an assassin on Grant's train?

[Jim Page]

(07-20-2015 03:46 PM)Rosieo Wrote:  I dont have a clue how they used the word "boy" in the mid 1800s...I am looking around to try and find out. Would it be used based on the person's station in life? Would a young soldier be called a boy or a soldier? Was boy used only for adults who were black?

Be careful not to put modern-day connotations on past usage. "Gay" once meant "cheerful," "boy" once meant "a young man," and when I used to hang out with the old jazz musicians in New Orleans as a kid, they used the word "black" as applied to other people of color with great care.

I hear a lot of people come up with backwards-constructed nonsense that betrays a total lack of knowledge. One of my guitar-playing buddies tried to expound on the word "cowboy" as having started as a racist slam against blacks working with cattle. Of course, he's a fellow who invested all his retirement savings in Beanie Babies years ago, certain he'd quadruple his money.

--Jim