Have you ever wondered about the origin of “cc,” a setting you likely use when sending an email message? Perhaps you are also curious about why the word “dime” appears in “drop a dime on” someone and “dime store.” Tune in to learn about some examples of modern usage that come from old or obsolete technology like typewriters and pay phones.
Typewriters (CC/Underlining)
Before smart phones, tablets, computers, and printers, there were typewriters, first manual and then electric. The first mention of a patent for something resembling a typewriter occurred in 1714, during the reign of Queen Anne in Britain. Mr. Henry Mill, an engineer, received a patent for “An artifical [sic] machine or method for the impressing or transcribing of letters singly or progressively one after another, as in writing…” This invention apparently went nowhere, because the next mention of a typewriter-related patent came more than 100 years later, in 1829 in America. Manual typewriters didn’t become practical until the late 1800s, and by 1909, typewriters were so popular that 89 manufacturers in America were producing them.
Typewriters were certainly an improvement on writing out everything by hand, but they did have limitations. Unlike with a printer these days, you couldn’t just print copies of something if you were using a typewriter. And that leads us to the origin of “cc,” which stands for “carbon copy.” If you were typing something and wanted another copy, you would put a piece of carbon paper between two sheets of regular paper. What you typed would be copied to the second piece of paper. The term “carbon paper” first appeared between 1875 and 1880, and “carbon copy” followed, coming into use between 1890 and 1895. The phrase “cc,” meaning to send a duplicate as far as business correspondence, appeared in 1936. You can now use “cc” as a verb, as in “I cc’d everyone in my department.” The word “cc’d” can be spelled either “cc’d” or “cc’ed,” with or without an “e.”
Another holdover from typewriters is underlining. These days, editors do not recommend using underlining for titles or to emphasize words. Instead, you can use italics or quotation marks for titles, depending on which style guide you follow, and bold for emphasis. In the days of typewriters, though, you couldn’t make text italics or bold. Typists had to go back and underline titles and emphasized words.
Telephones (Dial/Dimes)
Rotary phones and pay phones are two other old or obsolete technologies. For those of you who don’t know what a rotary phone is, it is an old-style telephone with a round dial. The numbers 0 through 9 appeared in a circle, as on a clock, and over each number was a metal plate that had round holes. For each number in a phone number, users put a finger in the appropriate round hole and moved their finger clockwise to dial the number. It took a while to dial a seven-digit number! These days, we do not actually dial a phone (unless we are using a very old telephone). However, we still use the word “dial” to mean “call” in expressions such as “Dial 911.”
People also used to make calls from pay phones, but these have fallen out of favor. According to an AT&T press release from December 5, 2007, the first phone booth in America appeared in Connecticut in 1890, and there were 2.6 million pay phones in the United States until 1998, when pay phone use started to decline. Phone calls using pay phones first cost a nickel and then, in the 1950s, a dime. The cost kept rising. Now, if you can find a pay phone, it costs about 50 cents per call. Despite this inflated price, we still use the phrase “drop a dime on” someone. This means to inform on someone, and the use of the word “dime” in this phrase comes from how much it cost to make a pay phone call back in the 1960s.
Dimes don’t buy much these days, but we still use the word in various other phrases. For example, you might hear someone say, “It’s a dime a dozen,” which means almost worthless. [10] You will also hear the phrase “dime store.” Country music fans might know Carrie Underwood’s song “Church Bells,” from her “Storyteller” album, released in 2015. In this song, a low-income woman wearing “a dime store dress” catches the eye of a rich oil man.
Starting in the late 19th century and early 20th century, shoppers could find various low-cost items at the dime store, also known as the ten-cent store or the five-and-ten. Items cost as little as five or ten cents. Prices aren’t that low now, of course, but in 1929, for example, a dime could buy goods that in 2017 cost $1.41. The year 1929 might ring a bell to those who know some history. On October 29, 1929, the U.S. stock market crashed and the Great Depression began. A 1932 song that became an anthem for that time was “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” Many people could not. These days, we don’t actually shop at dime stores. Rather, thanks to inflation, we go to dollar stores. Perhaps in a hundred years or so, people will shop at ten-dollar stores.
Odds and Ends (Tape/Food Stamps)
Before we finish, here are a few other common words or phrases that have origins in old things. When you want to record a TV show, you might say, “I need to tape that!” The verb “tape” to refer to recording on a tape came into use in 1950. Nowadays, videotapes are obsolete. As technology progressed, we referred to recording shows in various other manners, including “DVR,” from 1998, and “TiVo,” from 2000. It is not so common now to “TiVo” something, but we do still “DVR” shows. Now we also stream.
Our last obsolete-technology phrase is “food stamps.” This phrase refers to nutrition assistance to the needy, and it was first used between 1935 and 1940. Individuals received actual stamps that were orange or blue. Nowadays, the federal program that provides such assistance is abbreviated SNAP, which stands for “Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.” No actual stamps are given out anymore; rather, recipients use a benefits card.
Our trip down memory lane is over. Who knows what current technology will be obsolete yet featured in English in the future? Let me know if you have ideas.
That segment was written by Bonnie Mills, author of “The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier,” who blogs at sentencesleuth.blogspot.com.
Images courtesy of Shutterstock.
