Thirteen words taken from someone’s name

(because I think it’s fun to find out the origins of words)

(Thanks to The Reading Teacher’s Book of Lists by Fry, Kress, and Fountoukidis)

 

1.  boycott: named after Charles Boycott, a British army officer

2. Ferris wheel: Named after G.M. Ferris, an American engineer

3. America: Named after Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian merchant/explorer who came to the New World shortly after Christopher Columbus

4.  bloomers: Named after Amelia Bloomer, a pioneer and feminist who made them popular

5. macadam: Named after John Loudon McAdam, a Scottish engineer who invented the road-building material

6.  graham crackers: Named after Sylvester Graham, a vegetarian and an American reformer in dietetics

7. decibel: Named after Alexander Bell, a Scottish-American inventor of the telephone

8. volt: Named after Alessandro Volata, an Italian physicist

9. saxophone: Named after Anton Sax, a Belgian instrument maker who combined a clarinet’s reed with oboe fingering

10. sideburns: Named after Ambrose Burnside, a Civil War general and governor of Rhode Island who had thick side whiskers

11. vandal: Named after the Vandals, the Germanic tribe that sacked Rome

12. watt: Named after James Watt, a Scottish engineer and inventor

13. nicotine: Jean Nicot, a French diplomat who introduced the tobacco plant to France around 1561

 

Other Thursday Thirteens (Leave your name in comments, and I’ll add your link here)

 

Windy WingsWystful 1

Joan

Jane

Norma

Tennessee Mom X 2

Kelly

tnchick

Lyndsay

 

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