West Virginia Talk
Updated 26 Sept 2009
Unless otherwise indicated, these entries are expressions that I first heard during the 1950s and 1960s when I was growing up on White Oak Mountain on our farm near the Raleigh/Summers county line. After some of the phrases I have included information from references. And I have added contributions from visitors to this site.
If you have a West Virginia word or saying you want to share, please e-mail me. To help “place” the saying and put it in context, include your birthplace and age (optional, of course) and where and when you heard the expression. For example: Raleigh County, 1950s.
about to find pups – Pregnant. When I discovered my dog Lady had puppies, I ran “out the path” to my grandparents’ house to tell the news. I was mystified when my grandpa wasn’t surprised. How did he know? Nobody had discussed the fact that my dog was “about to find pups.” The state of expectant motherhood, animal or human, wasn’t a topic of conversation.
accafortis, strong as – Strong in flavor. “That coffee is as strong as accafortis.”
A contributor to the Phrase Finder site said: “This sounds like a corruption of ‘aqua fortis’ (Latin: ‘strong water’), which means nitric acid.” Also, I found the term in a book about phrases used by individual families:
“Anything that is especially strong in flavor, taste, or muscular ability is ‘stronger than accafortis’ in the family of Kenneth P. Weinkauf of Athens, Ohio. Nobody in the family knows what it means.” From “Family Words: The Dictionary for People Who Don’t Know a Frone from a Brinkle” by Paul Dickson (Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., 1988).
ackempucky – Any food mixture of unknown ingredients, West Virginia. From Informal English: Puncture Ladies, Egg Harbors, Mississippi Marbles, and Other Curious Words and Phrases of North America by Jeffrey Kacirk, Touchstone, New York, 2005, Page 1. Mr. Kacirk cites Harold Wentworth, The American Dialect Dictionary, New York, 1944.
act ugly – Be ill tempered; misbehave. Also, a second meaning: have illicit sex.
acting (getting) above your raisin’ – Conducting yourself in a manner that indicates the things of your childhood are now beneath you.
addled – Confused. “I’ve been addled since I hit my head.” It can also mean mental impairment. “That boy has been addled since he was born.”
bad off – Seriously ill. “I heard William is bad off.” The next phase would be “at the point of death.”
Bad Off Mountain – Mispronunciation of Batoff Mountain in Raleigh County, W.Va.
bad to – Made a habit of; prone to. “He was bad to drink.” “Here lately I’ve been bad to fall down.”
bag store/state store – A state-run liquor store. At one time privately owned liquor stores weren’t legal in West Virginia. “Bag store” refers to the little paper bags used to hold the bottles. “I see you’ve been to the bag store.” See poke store.
balloon ascension – JTF wrote that when something was slowly making his grandmother angry, “…she claimed to be taking a ‘balloon ascension.’” Wheeling, W.Va., 1950s. I am guessing balloon ascension is related to this phrase:
The balloon goes up -- trouble is brewing. During World War I and II, observatory or defensive barrage balloons were launched skyward before battle. “The mere fact that these…balloons had ‘gone up’ would signal that some form of action was imminent.” War Slang: American Fighting Words and Phrases from the Civil War to the War in Iraq, Second Edition, by Paul Dickson, 2007, First Bristol Park Books, New York. Page 337.
bealed – Red and inflamed. My great aunt Sarah told her granddaughter Carolyn and me that we would get “bealed heads” from sun-bathing. And we did.
Bible divorce – If a spouse commits adultery, the innocent party may get a divorce and remarry without religious censure. A person who divorces on grounds other than adultery and marries again is considered by some to be committing adultery with the new spouse.
big dinner – Church reunion, “dinner on the ground.” “Are you going to the big dinner at New Salem Missionary Baptist Church this year?”
biggidy – Acting biggidy is related to “too big for your britches.” See “Acting above your raisin’.”
bite to eat – A meal fit for a king was still called “a bite to eat.” To say otherwise was bragging. When company came and the food was ready, my mother would say, “I’ve fixed a bite to eat.” The “bite” to eat would include one, maybe two meats, corn, peas, beans, mashed potatoes, sliced cucumbers and tomatoes, cole slaw, cornbread or biscuits, “light” bread, hot coffee, sweet milk for the kids, and pie and cake.
Blow George – A big talker, someone who is boastful. It was considered impolite to tell of your accomplishments or possessions.
blink milk – sour milk. I’ve never heard this expression but I found it on a Web site: West Virginia Sayings, TheSolutionSite.com--K-12 thematic units with lesson plans. Accessed March 4, 2003.
The verb “blink” means “to turn sour” and comes from “blink” meaning “to exercise an evil influence, bewitch, hence to sour (souring of milk being formerly ascribed to witchcraft).” From the “Dictionary of American Regional English,” Volume 1 by Frederic G. Cassidy (1985, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., and London, England). Page 284. This reference also lists another term for sour milk -- “blue john.”
boys/girls – Sisters and brothers. “The ‘Underwood boys’ lived next to my family.”
brand-fired new/brand-spanking new – New. These are variations on “brand-new.”
“‘Brand-new has nothing to do with the brand name of a product. It is rather associated with the word ‘brand’ that is cognate with ‘fire,’ as in firebrand. The product would thus be fresh from the anvil, or as Shakespeare put it in ‘Twelfth Night,’ ‘fire-new.’” From “Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins” by Robert Hendrickson (Facts on File, New York, 1997). According to a second reference, the word “brand” “…dates back to the Middle Ages and earlier, when ‘brand’ meant ‘flame or torch’ as it does in the still current phrase ‘snatching a ‘brand’ from the burning.’ The description ‘brand-new’ in those days was applied to products – usually made of metal – newly taken from the flames in which they were molded.” From the “Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins” by William and Mary Morris (HarperCollins, New York, 1977, 1988),
bumfuzzled – Confused.
Cherry Creek dip, legend of – Cherry Creek dip is section of road in Raleigh County. If you drive slow there at night, a ghost will get in your car. Speed up and the ghost leaves. The ghost was a person killed in a wreck and won't stay in a speeding car. A version of the story is online at wvghosts.com
chow-chow – Home canned relish.
chuffy/chunky – Plump. Country people apparently don’t consider it an insult to point out that a person has gained weight.
churched – Taken off the church rolls for misconduct.
citified – Country people who have adopted city ways.
c***sucker -- Coal-mine operator or anyone else who takes advantage of working people.
come by it honest – Married when a child is conceived.
coming up a storm – A storm is brewing.
cry buckets of tears – Grieve heavily.
cut a rusty – Create a scene, draw attention to yourself. Perhaps behaving badly.
cyarn – When my aunt said my cousin and I were “full of cyarn” after playing in the dirt, I took it to mean our faces needed scrubbing. Here’s another meaning:
“Cyarn (kyarn), n., — carrion, putrefying meat.” From “Southern Mountain Speech” by Cratis D. Williams (Berea College Press, 1992).
decorate graves – Clean off the graveyard and place flowers and other decorations on the graves. This was a family occasion. The men mowed and the women decorated the graves and assembled a picnic lunch. The children played but were cautioned to never step on the graves. Stepping on graves was disrespectful.
Didn't say "dog"– "He left and didn't say 'dog.'" The person left without saying a word. Close-mouthed. A woman who grew up in Temple Hill, Barren County, Ky., in the 1950s remembers an expanded version: “He didn't say dog how come you put your eye out."
do-less – Lazy. Wouldn't hit a lick at a snake.
Don’t try and teach your grandma to suck eggs – Don’t try to teach an expert. I don’t think anyone knows exactly how this phrase got started. On a farm, an egg-sucking dog (a dog that steals eggs and eats them) is bad. (See egg-sucking dog.) During one discussion on Phrase Finder, it was said that maybe grandma didn’t have teeth so she sucked soft-boiled eggs.
“…This particular expression is well over two hundred years old; it is just a variation of an older theme that was absurd enough to appeal to the popular fancy. One of the earliest of these is given in Udall’s translation of ‘Apophthegmes (1542) from the works of Erasmus. It reads: ‘A swyne to teach Minerua, was a prouerbe, for which we sai: Englyshe to teach our dame to spyne.’ (don’t try to teach a dame to spin)” From “Hog on Ice” by Charles Earle Funk (Harper & Row, New York, 1948).
Don't wash your dishes in slop – always clean off any food that remained on the dishes before putting them in your dish water. "One of Mother's rules." Raleigh County. 1950s. Submitted by BGC.
dying off – High mortality rate among a particular group. “The old folks are dying off.”
Eaten sufficient and suffanciful – Humorous statement said at the end of a meal to indicate you’ve had enough food.
egg-sucking dog – A creature, man or beast, that you don’t want around. Useless, mean.
ever (every) whipstitch – At short intervals. “He came by the house every whipstitch.” Comes from a sewing technique.
father (or daddy) my children – Be careful to establish paternity of one’s children through serial monogamy – one man at a time. No DNA testing necessary. I heard a family friend say that people thought she was awful because she was an unwed mother but that she “fathered” her boy, she knew who his father was.
feel condemned/be under conviction – Something is weighing heavily on your mind and you feel compelled to correct the situation. It could relate to religious conversion or a secular matter, like mending a quarrel with a family member.
fixin’ on a knuckle -- At the Tolliver family reunion in Raleigh County, W.Va., Stephen Tolliver of Cool Ridge, around 86, was giving directions. He said, "You go down this here road and when you're fixin' on a knuckle, you take a left turn right there." He meant when the road was turning slightly like it would if you represent it with your crooked index finger, that was the place where you turned -- as the road "bent" slightly, or "at the knuckle." Contributed by GK.
flat as a fritter – Flat as a pancake.
fly mad -- Get angry suddenly; in a rage. “I didn’t expect her to fly mad over that.” Maybe this expression is related to “madder than a wet hen.” A mad hen tends to fly around and flap her wings.
fried pie –A round of biscuit dough filled with apples, folded and baked in the oven with a lot of grease.
This was called a half-moon pie in “Mountain Range: A Dictionary of Expressions from Appalachia to the Ozarks” by Robert Hendrickson (Volume IV, Facts on File Dictionary of American Regional Expressions, Facts on File, New York, N.Y.,1997).
gallivanting around – Going a variety of places. Said by Kathryn Kinser, 1940s/50s. Contributed by GK. My folks also said “sworping around” and “fanning around.”
glom onto/ cabbage onto – Take something that doesn’t belong to you or you don’t deserve.
go all the way to Egery and back – A long distance. “I had to go all the way to Egery and back to get this dog.” This refers to the community of Egeria in Mercer County.
go (went) to housekeeping/set up housekeeping – Marry and establish your first home. “We lived at Jumping Branch when we first went to housekeeping.”
God put the good stuff where the lazy people can’t have any -- Statement by man talking about picking possum grapes, the grapes that make the best jelly. Joe Aliff, Rock Creek, W.Va., 1995, audio clip, "Tending the Commons: Folklife and Landscape in Southern West Virginia,” excerpts from the Coal River Folklife Project. Archive of Folk Culture, American Folklife Center, Library of Congress, Call Number AFC 1999/008 NRG-MH-A077. Accessed online on Dec. 5, 2002.
good-hearted – Kind and generous.
got caught – Pregnant.
hard road – a paved road. Radio show host and writer Garrison Keillor tells about one country gentleman whose ambition was to “live on the hard road and take the paper.”
hold your tater (potato) – Be patient.
I don’t chew my cabbage twice – Response when someone asks you to repeat what you just said.
I'm gonna beat the fire out of you if you don't behave yourself – "From my mother when I misbehaved." Raleigh County. Submitted by BGC.
ink pen – a pen, a writing instrument.
Iron-horse Irish – Irishmen who worked on the railroad. “Irishmen ran the Chesapeake and Ohio’s Hinton (W.Va.) division…And if you’re 65 years old, and if, as a youngster, you ever rode the C&O through West Virginia, your life and safety could have been in the hands of an entire crew of Irishmen whose grandfathers came from County Clare…The Irishmen came from Clare and Kerry shortly after the Civil War to work on the railroad construction job.” “The Iron-Horse Irish” by Andrew Leonard, Charleston Gazette, W.Va., Magazine section, Page 79, 18 Aug 1957.
It'll outrun a scared haint – a car that ran fast. Raleigh County. 1950s. Submitted by BGC.
jerked up by the hair of the head – kids that were raised up in bad conditions at home. Raleigh County. 1950s. Submitted by BGC.
kindly – Kind of. “I’d kindly like to go to town today.”
kitchen pass – Said by Nora Tolliver Hatcher, late 1940s/50s. Contributed by GK. Word Spy online defines the term as permission from a spouse.
knock him on his bal sege — “When Joe Gere was a small child in Appalachia, his family lifestyle was as Hungarian as if he’d lived in Budapest. In bituminous coal towns like Pursglove, West Virginia (population two hundred), the citizens were classified as ‘wops,’ ‘Johnny Bulls,’ ‘micks,’ ‘Polocks’ and other racist names. Hungarians were ‘hunkies.’ Second-generation Americans like little Joey were taught to stand straight when they were called such names, and if the insult was repeated, they were instructed to knock the offender on his ‘bal sege,’ a family phrase which was pronounced ‘ball sheggee’ and meant ‘left ass.’” From “Salt of the Earth: One Family’s journey Through the Violent American Landscape” by Jack Olsen (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1996).
lay a corpse – A reference to a time period between death and burial when the body is at the funeral home. “We had that bad storm when John lay a corpse.”
lick your calf over (again) – Have to re-do a piece of work. It refers to a cow licking its calf from top to bottom then over again. I’ve only heard this in West Virginia. However, an Internet contact from Alabama said it’s common there and said: “It is commonly used by small businessmen to mean having to go back on a job again. A warranty. Usually it is just said ‘I’ll have to lick my calf on this one.’ I have always assumed that it meant a disagreeable task required by honor or duty.”
light a fire under – Inspire to work faster.
light bread – Store-bought sandwich bread. This bread was set aside for school lunches since the other children would tease if a child brought biscuits or cornbread in his lunch.
live in a brick house in town – Living conditions of someone who has come up in the world.
look the beans – Sort through dry beans, picking out little stones and dirt, before cooking.
mean as a striped snake – Pronounced with two syllables – stripe-ed snake. Mean as a poisonous snake.
mess of beans -- Enough for a meal.
messing and gomming (gauming) – Doing something in a careless or ineffective fashion.
miners’ hospitals –The West Virginia legislature passed an act in 1899 providing for the construction and maintenance of three hospitals in different coalfield regions to care for "persons injured while engaged in employments dangerous to health, life, and limb." Known as miner's hospitals, they were open to all state residents, but special preferences like free treatment were extended to coal miners and railroad workers. From “Women's Work in the West Virginia Economy” by Mary Beth Pudup. Retrieved on May 22, 2001, from the West Virginia History and Archives site http://www.wvculture.org/history/journal_wvh/wvh49-2.html
Mr. Cartoon – Host of a children’s show on WSAZ-TV, Huntington. George Lewis was the original Mr. Cartoon. Jule Huffman took over the role in 1969 when Mr. Lewis left WSAZ to take a job with a Maryland television station. An update on Mr. Huffman http://www.wsaz.com/wsazhistory/misc/9069941.html Accessed April 25, 2009.
new-ground – Land that’s never been farmed.
odd-turned/not right – Eccentric. Exhibiting behavior beyond “normal.”
offer to – Try to. “The dog didn’t offer to bite me.”
Our people live so long that we will have to knock each other in the head on judgment day – "Quoted by my mother about her relatives." Raleigh County. Submitted by BGC.
Pinecrest yodel – Hacking cough. Refers to the Pinecrest Tuberculosis Sanitorium in Beckley, W.Va.
play pretty – Toy.
poke store -- the local liquor store. "My Dad's saying." Raleigh County. 1940s. Submitted by BGC. See bag store.
pouring down rain – Heavy rain.
proud – Stuck up. The opposite of humble. “Is she ‘proud’?”
put the quietus on – See quietus.
quietus – Put the quietus on: shut somebody up or put an end to an activity.
“Quietus – Quietus derives from the Latin ‘quietus est,’ ‘he is quiet.’ The word originally applied only to the discharge of any financial account, or the settlement of obligation. But ‘quietus’ came to apply to the discharge of life itself, as Shakespeare used it in Hamlet: Who would fardels (burdens) bear…When he himself might his quietus make; With a bare bodkin (dagger)?” From “Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins” by Robert Hendrickson (Fact on File, New York, 1997).
quile up – Coil up, like a snake. My maternal grandmother told about as a child jumping over a snake that was “quiled up. It looked like a big yellow ‘mushyroom.’” She was bitten but survived due to all the layers of slips she wore and the doctor’s ministerings. The doctor cut an X on the wound then drew the poison out by applying chicks that were torn apart live.
raise hell and put a prop under it – Said by contributor's grandmother, Wheeling, W.Va., 1950s. Contributed by JTF.
red as a beet – Flushed.
Rex and Eleanor – Charles “Rex” Parker and wife Eleanor Neira Parker performed for radio, TV and live audiences for many years in southern West Virginia and Virginia. “…Rex and Eleanor Parker were, as Eleanor now claims, ‘bywords’ in southern West Virginia.” From “The Airwaves of Zion: Radio and Religion in Appalachian” by Howard Dorgan, University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville, 1993. Chapter 3, Rex and Eleanor Parker and the Songs of Salvation, Page 73-112.
right smart – A large amount.
rob the bees -- Harvest the honey. This done at night because the bees were asleep and more docile. The men used "smokers" to further immobilize the bees. They left honey for the bees to eat over the winter and it was done at a time when there were still warm days so the bees had time to make more before bad weather. The honey was left on the comb and put in clean jars.
ridden hard and put away wet -- A phrase describing somebody who looks disheveled. Much like a horse that was ridden hard and put in the barn without grooming and a cool-down period. "He looks like he was ridden hard and put away wet." Said by Lillian Hatcher, 70, Cool Ridge, Raleigh County, W.Va., in 1950s. Contributed by GK.
rough – Said of a woman with a bad reputation. You could get a reputation by living with a man not your husband. Hanging around where the menfolks waited for their wives at G.C. Murphy’s store, laughing and making eye contact with the men, could also get a woman labeled as “rough.” Generally a woman didn’t “lollygag” and talk to a man that wasn’t a blood relative. If you needed to ask a man something, you communicated through his wife. “Does Fred want a cup of coffee?”
rough as pig iron – meaning someone was on the wild side. Raleigh County. Submitted by BGC. According to Merriam-Webster, pig iron (1665) is “crude iron that is the direct product of the blast furnace and is refined to produce steel, wrought iron, or ingot iron.”
rubbin’ doctor – An osteopathic physician. “Dr. Eva Teter Hammer of Beaver, W.Va., was a ‘rubbin’ doctor.’”
sarvice tree – Service tree. These trees produce white flowers in the spring, a time when itinerate preachers would come around to conduct religious services.
sitting careless – Women and girls were to sit with their knees together and their dresses down. To do otherwise put you at risk of being told you were “sitting careless with your big legs shining.” Like Jerry Lee Lewis sings, “Big legged women, keep your dresses down.”
split the mud – Run fast. Mr. Henderson lists a similar phrase in “Mountain Range”: cut the mud.
staggery – Dizzy.
steal pennies off a dead man’s eyes – Dishonest.
They try and go home every weekend -- Punchline to a West Virginia joke. A newcomer to heaven was being given a tour. Each mansion and grounds were home to a particular ethnic group. The new guy noticed that the gates were padlocked at the entrance to one mansion. "Who lives there?" he asked. "Oh, those are the West Virginians. If we don't lock the gate, they try and go home every weekend."
tight as Dick’s hatband (headband) – Something that’s stuck. “This jar lid is on tight as Dick’s hatband.” I’ve only heard this expression in West Virginia and Kentucky. But an Internet acquaintance says it’s also common among 50+ adults in Alabama. I’ve also heard people use it to mean someone is “tight” as in drunk, but that’s not how we used the expression. Here’s a theory about its origin:
“as queer (or tight) as Dick’s hatband — Absurdly queer, or as the case may be, inordinately tight. The ‘Dick’ alluded to in this metaphor was Richard Cromwell, ‘Lord protector’ of England for a few months, September 1658 to May 1659. He had been nominated by his father, the powerful Oliver Cromwell, to succeed him in this high office, and was actually so proclaimed. But whereas the father had served, at least from the death of Charles I in 1649, as quasi-king of England, king in fact if not in name, Richard would gladly have accepted both title and crown, had not the army been hostile to such action and, indeed, to Richard, who was shortly dismissed from office. The crown was the ‘hatband’ in the saying, which was deemed a ‘queer’ adornment for the head of one so briefly in highest office, and too ‘tight’ for him to have worn in safety. (Let me add, however, this account is not accepted by the Oxford English Dictionary, though no better substitute is offered.)” “Heavens to Betsy” by Charles Earle Funk (1955).
trouble and sorrow – Lament of a old woman who came to our house after the car she was riding in broke down on White Oak Mountain. “Trouble and sorrow. Trouble and sorrow,” she said.
Wrench (rinse) your green beans three times to get the canning water off of them before cooking – "Mother's rule." Raleigh County. 1950s. Submitted by BGC. A couple of my mother’s rules: Don’t use your hand to mash down trash. Never put a sharp knife down in dishwater. Mom cut her hand doing just that. So she passed along that lesson learned to me.
Karen, native of Beckley, W.Va. -- My sister in law is from South Carolina and we were working in the yard. We needed to water the plants, so she said, "Where is the hose pipe?" She meant the water hose! They still call it a hose pipe. Also, when it was going to rain, she would say, "It's comin up a cloud."
Hosepipe -- refers to a garden hose. This term seems to be used by people who grew up west of Charlotte,N.C., especially Gaston County. From “Dictionary of American Regional English,” Volume II, D-H, by Frederic G. Cassidy and Joan Houston Hall, 1991, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., and London, England. Page 1122.
Debbie wrote: My mother was born and raised in Lynchburg, VA in 1923, and she used to say tight as Dick's hatband to mean someone was stingy with their money. My mother was raised on a tobacco farm. Also from my mother: well cut my legs off and call me Shorty was an expression of surprise. I'm like the little boy who fell off the cart, I ain't in it was her way of staying out of the conversation or argument. Hard road to hoe meant you had a hard time of it, a tough life. You make my ass wanna chew tobacca, meant you were fed up with that person, or didn't believe them, or didn't feel sorry for them. Do as I say, not as I do meant don't follow me as an example.
Bill, Kentucky – I'd rather hold a horse in the rain. Comment about an unattractive woman.
Don, Kentucky – I'm going back in. Meaning “I’m going home to the mountains this weekend.” Said by a Pikeville, Ky., man who was working in Louisville, late 1960s.
Brian, Kentucky – Running around like a pack of wild dogs. Disorganized and in a panic.
Brenda, Kentucky – I feel like I've been lifting logs all day. Very tired.
Diana, native of Temple Hill, Barren County, Ky. – "I bet that musician is flatter than a biscuit." Meaning he is probably broke and "flat on his a**." Her mother’s sayings: "If a frog had wings, it wouldn't bump its ass on the ground." This was in reply to the "if I had..." whining statements. "You are squirming around like a worm in hot ashes" which really means you should be still. "A child is more important than any man or anything on Earth and you won't understand that until you have one." Phrases from Hart County, Ky., around 1971. "Don't worry about the mule going blind, just keep on driving the wagon." Translated, it means just keep your mind on your business and stick to the task at hand."I am going to operate the Delco." This means I am going to set the radio station. Delco means radio in this case.
Mussel brailler John Goheen of Calvert City, Ky. – I’ll pay you when the shell boat comes. Mr. Goheen, who harvests and sells mussels, was one of the Kentucky river men featured on “World of Our Own: Kentucky Folkways,” #102 "The Culture of Work (Part 2)" aired on KET, June 6, 2009. http://www.ket.org/folkways/programs.htm
Colloquialisms -- Site owner Linda Cunningham Fluharty writes: "I grew up in the country, on Boggs Run, in Marshall County, West Virginia. My dad, Jack Cunningham, was born and raised there and he helped me with this project in the year preceding his death on May 7, 2000."
The Phrase Finder -- Site founded in 1997 by Gary Martin, who writes the Meanings and Origins section of the site and the Phrase A Week posts. It grew out of an interest in computational linguistics that was developed during his post-graduate research in 1985 and later while working in an IBM-financed research project at Sheffield Hallam University. Includes a discussion forum where you can ask questions about the origins of English-language phrases.
