what are the origins of Grand Pooh-bah?
151061
The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary gives the\nfollowing for the etymology for "Grand Pooh Bah":\n\n  "Pooh-Bah", character in Gilbert and Sullivan's\n  opera "The Mikado" (1885) bearing the title\n  Lord-High-Everything-Else
1041300
The name "Pom" is said to derive from Australia's origins as a convict colony. Each unfortunate transported down under from Britain for his or her (mostly) petty crime was said to be a "Prisoner of Her Majesty" or POHM, later simplified to POM.  \n\nHowever, there is an alternative explanation as  Pom was around a few years before Word War II.  In fact, we first come across it in print during World War I, in 1914, as a derogatory term for an immigrant to Australia from England.  It is a quotation from D.H. Lawrence's Kangaroo in 1923 that gives us the most popularly accepted etymology of this word: "Pommy is supposed to be short for pomegranate. Pomegranate, pronounced invariably 'pommygranate', is a near enough rhyme to immigrant, in a naturally rhyming country. Furthermore, immigrants are known in their first months, before their blood ‘thins down’, by their round and ruddy cheeks. So we are told."  Slang lexicographer Eric Partridge also favors the pomegranate derivation, and he gives a slightly more detailed explanation by quoting from H.J. Rumsey's The Pommies (1920): "Colonial boys and girls, ready to find a nickname, were fond of rhyming Immigrant, Jimmy-grant, Pommegrant, and called it to the new chum children.  The name stuck and became abbreviated to pommy later on."  Partridge also believes that the word was being used as far back as the end of the 19th century.  It is often the case with slang that it is spoken for several years before it is put into writing. Anyhow, the OED is careful to note that there is no good evidence supporting the pomegranate derivation.
178226
My middle name is Patrick, I think they created this holiday for me! (thats what my mommy told me)\n\nActually, it originated in Ireland from an old mythical tale- and YES, some DO celebrate it in some parts of Ireland.
728051
Dates back to the 1930's Depression era where there was extreme poverty and many people lived in dirty conditions. Some people say it dates back to England in the 1500's where finished floors were rare, but this origin has not been proven
35571
I'm not going to copy all the information, but there's an article on it on wikipedia.\n\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canned_laughter
99073
During the 'brown period' (betweeen 11 BC and 9 BC), caves were filled with shit and puke. Man tried everything including cooking, which cured the shits for good. BTW, that was also the origin of the word "BINGO!"
1118539
There is a Chinese story of a cosmic egg. At the beginning of time all was chaos, and this chaos was shaped like a hen's egg. Inside the egg were Yin and Yan, ..........   One day the warring entities inside the egg rent it apart. the heavier elements sank, to form the earth, and the lighter ones floated, to form the sky. And betweenthe earth and the sky was P'an-ku, the first being.......There is a dragon mentioned in the story too.   Probably not the story you are looging for but a parallel one from another culture.
627130
This expression originated in the United States in about 1900. The phrase may have some Latin connection. When a Roman boy was in trouble, he cried ‘patrue mi Patruissime’ (‘Uncle my best of uncles’).
870919
There are a couple of theories about the origin of "Happy as Larry".\nIt may have originated as either Australian or New Zealand slang sometime before 1875 when New Zealand writer G L Meredith, who wrote: “We would be as happy as Larry if it were not for the rats.” \nThere is also a suggestion that it comes from the name of the nineteenth-century Australian Larry Foley.\nFoley was a successful boxer who never lost a fight. He retired at 32 and collected a purse of £1,000 for his final fight.
1161678
It's a euphemism for "damn hell" originating in the late 19th or early 20th centuries, when many such euphemisms became popular, such as\n\nGee whiz\nGosh darn\nCrimeny\nJeez\nDash it all\nHoly cow\nHoly moley\nCripes\n...and many, many, many more.
312140
I don't know the history. We have them in 5 different towns around me every year. I do know the food is bomb!!! Sorry for not actually answering your question, I just really love that supa and meat!!
169820
Grand Old Party \n\n\nA favorite of headline writers, GOP dates back to the 1870s and '80s. The abbreviation was cited in a New York Herald story on October 15, 1884; "' The G.O.P. Doomed,' shouted the Boston Post.... The Grand Old Party is in condition to inquire...." \n\nBut what GOP stands for has changed with the times. In 1875 there was a citation in the Congressional Record referring to "this gallant old party," and , according to Harper's Weekly, in the Cincinnati Commercial in 1876 to "Grand Old Party." \n\nPerhaps the use of "the G.O.M." for Britain's Prime Minister William E. Gladstone in 1882 as " the Grand Old Man" stimulated the use of GOP in the United States soon after. \n\nIn early motorcar days, GOP took on the term "get out and push." During the 1964 presidential campaign, "Go-Party" was used briefly, and during the Nixon Administration, frequent references to the "generation of peace" had happy overtones. In line with moves in the '70s to modernize the party, Republican leaders took to referring to the "grand old party," harkening back to a 1971 speech by President Nixon at the dedication of the Eisenhower Republican Center in Washington, D.C. \n\nIndeed, the "grand old party" is an ironic term, since the Democrat Party was organized some 22 years earlier in 1832.
457033
Speculation about its origin is found in Eric Partridge's "Dictionary of Catch Phrases":\n\n"'Come up and see my etchings' was, perhaps, orig. a US students' catchphrase that rapidly gained a much wider currency: throughout the US, thence in Can. and UK and, prob. indicative of US influence in 1943-5, Aus. Formerly I suspected that it was prompted by [Mae West's] 'come up and see me sometime!'; yet it could well have been the other way about. In his letter . . . Prof. S. H. Monk writes: "I am certain that I knew this sentence by the midtwenties. Actually I knew no one who had a collection of etchings or who was suave enough to seduce a young thing in this manner. But the phrase certainly floated in and out of cartoons and jokes. To me, it has an 1890-ish or Edwardian tone, and I suspect that it existed in 'sophisticated' urban society before it ever reached me. I think that this can still sometimes be heard, but it is definitely 'corny'."\nPerhaps confirmatory of Prof. Monk's shrewd remarks is the fact that in Susannah Centlivre's comedy, 'The Man's Bewitched' (1710), Act III, where Belinda, Maria, Constant and Lovely are in the study, and Lovely exclaims, 'Interrogating! Nay, then 'tis proper to be alone; there is a very pretty Collection of Prints in the next Room, Madam, will you give me leave to explain them to you?' Maria answers, 'Any Thing that may divert your Love--Subject.'\nIt should, however, be noted that this catchphrase perhaps derives from Surreyside melodrama--the villain enticing the innocent maiden."
834785
i really have no idea where it came from. for some reasons monkeys come to mind. i think they were carriers and some human got it and then it just kindof spread from there. it took a while to become mainstream.
451695
Hooah is a term that means basically anything you want it to mean.  I was told it came from the acronym HUA meaning Heard Understood and Acknowledged.
651087
"The OED cites an 1811 reference to a "pig" as a Bow Street Runner--the early police force, named after the location of their headquarters, before Sir Robert Peel and the Metropolitan Police Force (see above.) Before that, the term "pig" had been used as early as the mid-1500s to refer to a person who is heartily disliked."\n\n2nd link shows the Cleveland Police Seal, looking suspicously porcine...
958377
The origins of this symbol are unknown, but several theories have been proposed. According to one theory, in its original form, the jackass was born in the intense mudslinging that occurred during the presidential race of 1828 as a play on the name of Andrew Jackson, the Democratic candidate. Jackson had been called "Andrew Jackass," and the defiant Jackson adopted the nickname.\n\nOn January 19, 1870, a political cartoon by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly titled "A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion" revived the donkey as a symbol for the Democratic Party (the symbol had also been used in the 1830s). Cartoonists followed Nast and used the donkey to represent the Democrats, and the elephant to represent the Republicans.