# Concerning Gomers, goomers, and goobers **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 15, 2001, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823 "2001-09-15T15:09:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2001, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/1 "2001-09-15T15:09:47Z")
I’ve heard Granny on the “Beverly Hillbillies” refer to people as “goomers,” the same way that some might use “yo-yos” or “chuckleheads.” Is/was that an acutal slang in some part of the country, or was it coined just for the program. Goober replaced cousin Gomer on “Andy Griffith,” then later on “Mayberry RFD.” “Goober” is a old word for peanut with an \*African etymology, but I’ve heard the term used in recent (past 20 :eek: or so years) as a synonym for “rube” or “hick.” Was “goober” ever a word for “hick” before the programs, or did it just simply arrive that eponomously as Goober was the resident hick in Mayberry? \*And, other than recurring character “Ralph,” portrayed by Charles Lampkin and his son (whom I do not recall), and a guest appearance by Roy Glenn, the **only** things with African heritage to be seen in Mayberry.☹ ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2001, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/2 "2001-09-15T17:17:02Z")
The **OED** cites an 1871 reference indicating that during the Civil war, raw recruits from the Carolinas were called _goobers_ after the peanut. I have not been able to find anything on gomer or goomer. I do note that both **B** and **M** are voiced bilabials and wonder if the switch was simply a phonetic one with no other outside sources. The speculation would then be a simple phonetic shift from goober to goomer to gomer. OTOH, goomer and gomer may simply owe their existence to television, I really don’t know. Since neither the man named Gomer in Genesis and Chronicles nor the woman named Gomer in Hosea (according to the English translations, of course), are depicted as particularly foolish or as hicks, I doubt that there is a carryover from that source. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2001, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/3 "2001-09-15T17:35:31Z")
Goomer is also a medical slang term for a trauma patient who arrives with overwhelming and untreatable injuries. It’s an acronym for “get out of my emergency room.” ---
**Author:** ![robinh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b77776/32.png) [@robinh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robinh)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2001, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/4 "2001-09-15T23:39:32Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Little Nemo \* > \*\*Goomer is also a medical slang term for a trauma patient who arrives with overwhelming and untreatable injuries. It’s an acronym for “get out of my emergency room.” \*\* I seem to remember (and this is from reading _House of God_ oh so many years ago) that “Gomer”, as in “get out of my emergency room”, actually referred to people who came in with problems that weren’t actually life threatening, but then were difficult to send somewhere else, once they’d been admitted. Sending such a patient to another ward, for someone else to deal with, was (IIRC) referred to as “buffing and turfing.” ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2001, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/5 "2001-09-15T23:57:57Z")
House of God laws about gomers: 1. Gomers don’t die 2. Gomers always go to ground. 3. The art of medicine is to do as much buffing and turfing as possible ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2001, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/6 "2001-09-16T05:04:25Z")
I’ll bow to the superior knowledge of robinh and Qadgop on the subject of gomerology. It’s been so long since I read _House of God_ I wasn’t even able to remember the title until they mentioned it. ---
**Author:** ![Yeah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/dbc845/32.png) [@Yeah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yeah)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2001, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/7 "2001-09-16T16:35:51Z")
“that “Gomer”, as in “get out of my emergency room”, actually referred to people who came in with problems that weren’t actually life threatening, but then were difficult to send somewhere else” The idea that “gomer” is an acronym for “get out of my emergency room” is clever but false. A patient’s transferability is not the key criterion. What makes a patient a gomer is the patient’s loss of mental faculties. A person in an irreversible coma is a gomer, regardless of how easy they might be to transfer. At the same time, a chronic alcoholic who hasn’t changed or even removed his clothes for two weeks and who has no acute medical problem other than a blood alchol of 0.20, someone whom you really don’t want in your emergency room, is not a gomer if they can carry on a conversation. IIRC, another medical-oriented movie (“Coma”?) used gomer in the correct sense when a patient suffered a sever, irreversible neurological insult and one of the staff referred to her or him as “a real gome.” I am confident that the modern medical us of gomer is derived from Gomer Pyle, a character with an intellectual functioning somewhere between normal and true medical gomerhood. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2001, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/8 "2001-09-16T17:41:24Z")
The House of God which popularized the term ‘gomer’ (fem. gomere) stated that it referred to a person who had lost that part of themselves which makes them human, i.e. cognitive functioning. ---
**Author:** ![Torgo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@Torgo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Torgo)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2001, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/9 "2001-09-16T23:55:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mjollnir \* > \*\*I’ve heard Granny on the “Beverly Hillbillies” refer to people as “goomers,” the same way that some might use “yo-yos” or “chuckleheads.” Is/was that an acutal slang in some part of the country, or was it coined just for the program. > > Goober replaced cousin Gomer on “Andy Griffith,” then later on “Mayberry RFD.” “Goober” is a old word for peanut with an _African etymology, but I’ve heard the term used in recent (past 20 :eek: or so years) as a synonym for “rube” or “hick.” Was “goober” ever a word for “hick” before the programs, or did it just simply arrive that eponomously as Goober was the resident hick in Mayberry?_\* 1.) “Goomers” most likely came about because Paul Henning and Dick Wesson, who wrote the “Hillbillies” episodes, found it funny when Irene Ryan barked the word in her Granny voice. It’s also likely a subtle reference to Goober of “The Andy Griffith Show”; both shows appeared on the CBS network throughout the 60s. 2.) As far as I know, both “goober” and “gomer” are used prodigiously as redneck epithets and most likely came about as a result of “The Andy Griffith Show”'s immense popularity. Shouting “Floyd” or “Emmett” at truckloads of inbred moonshiners just doesn’t carry the same punch. \ Goober didn’t really _replace_ Gomer on the show; they were actually on at the same time. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2001, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/10 "2001-09-17T00:42:22Z")
**tomndebb** probably has the “goober” right. Lighter does give an earlier cite than the OED. 1862, “The Lt…was such a “goober” I don’t believe he knew which road to take.” Lighter also cites 1863, “conscripts by the dozen…some from Mississippi state and “Goobers” from Tar river.” This would indicate that it was used to simply mean a native of the Carolinas at the time. Lighter cites **Goomer** as first appearing in the _Beverly Hillbillies_, 1966. Meaning a “goof.” **Gomer Pyle** first appeared on _The Andy Griffith Show_ sometime between the Spring of '63 and the Summer of '64. In 1964, the term **gomer** is cited in print to mean (per Lighter) “a patient, especially if elderly, who is dirty, undesirable, or unresponsive to treatment, especially a poor or homeless man who habitually seeks emergency-room treatment for minor or imaginary complaints.” ---
**Author:** ![Yeah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/dbc845/32.png) [@Yeah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yeah)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2001, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/11 "2001-09-17T06:20:33Z")
"In 1964, the term gomer is cited in print to mean (per Lighter) “a patient, especially if elderly, who is dirty, undesirable, or unresponsive to treatment, especially a poor or homeless man who habitually seeks emergency-room treatment for minor or imaginary complaints.” Perhaps in print but not in real life. In real life I have never heard a medical person use “gomer” that way. The definition given by Lighter could apply to a shpos (a patient who is dirty, undesirable, etc.) or to a crock (a patient who seeks emergency-room treatment for minor or imaginary complaints). ---
**Author:** ![Popup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/94ad74/32.png) [@Popup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Popup)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2001, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/12 "2001-09-17T11:51:09Z")
Coincidence? Michel Quinion just ran a piece on [**gomer**](http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-gom1.htm)in his weekly piece Wold Wide Words. (He’s just revamped the site. Looks nice!) The conclusion is pretty much the same as we see here: > [@](#): > > The term often appears in glossaries of the sort of medical jargon that never appears, or should never appear, in patients’ notes. > … > It is often said to be an acronym of “Get Out of My Emergency Room!” He also traces the source back to the 60’s: > [@](#): > > It’s more likely that it actually comes from a character played by Jim Nabor in the Andy Griffith Show on CBS television in the US in 1963-64. The name of his character was Gomer Pyle, a mechanic with a pleasant character but dim-witted, as thick as two planks, a real local yokel. He concludes thus: > [@](#): > > Quite how the name shifted from the world of motor repairs and military life to medical matters is far from clear, and it’s this gap in understanding that stops more careful dictionaries from citing these TV shows as the source. However, a key influence is a book on medical life called House of God written pseudonymously under the name Samuel Shem and published in 1978. This popularised the medical sense as an acronym for “Get Out of My Emergency Room” and may indeed have invented it, perhaps on the basis of the slightly older sense of the word. Read his piece, even if he doesn’t have much new info, it’s a pleasant read. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2001, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/13 "2001-09-17T12:51:15Z")
I looked up _gomer_ in a Hebrew dictionary. The verb g-m-r means ‘to finish’, so _gomer_ would be literally ‘the one who finishes’. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2001, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/14 "2001-09-18T02:41:01Z")
**Yeah** I see your point about my post. You justifyably have a bone to pick with the way I worded my post. Sometimes it’s hard to give cites without going into incredible detail. This is one example. Lighter uses the definition which I gave, but his definition is more of a summary of all the cites for the term over a _period of time_. It was my fault not to say that. The original 1964 medical/use cite was from _The Journal of American Folklore._ The next one was 1972 in _National Lampoon_. "Gomer–A senile, messy,or highly unpleasant patient. Then the 1978 cites from _House of God_. Also, in 1978, from _Journal of American folklore_ "On the east coast of the United States, gomer is explained as an acronym for _Get Out of My Emergency Room._ On the west coast, the interpretation more usually advanced is _Grand Old Man of the Emergency Room._ 1979, in _American Speech_: The patient will become a _gomer_ “unresponsive patient” within a short period of time. **Jomo Mojo** William Safire offered the g-m-r/Hebrew etymology about 1982. Lighter dismisses it with the comment “…1982 quote does not merit consideration.” ---
**Author:** ![evilhanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba8739/32.png) [@evilhanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilhanz)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2001, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/15 "2001-09-18T03:34:22Z")
What about **Goofers**? Here in the mountains of the Northeast, those folks who work in the backcountry or at summit stations refer to tourists and hikers as goofers. I’ve never heard this term outside of the region. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2001, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/16 "2001-09-18T03:43:19Z")
Lighter cites “goofer” from 1918: “They’re promoted to goopher standing. Then…they have to prove themselves gimpers.” F. Scott Fitzgerald uses it in 1920, spelled the same way. More cites from the 1920’s. All the cites together would indicate “a clumsy fool; lout; goof.” [Lighter] So the word goes back a ways. ---
**Author:** ![DoctorJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctorj/32/2904_2.png) [@DoctorJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DoctorJ)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2001, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/17 "2001-09-18T04:18:25Z")
We tend to use “gomer” as explained by Yeah–a patient who has minimal mental faculties remaining. They often stay on our service (I’m on Medicine at the VA this month) mostly because they have nowhere else to go. The even-less-kind term for a gomer is a “turn and water”. This is to be distinguished from a “camper”, which is a patient of relatively better function who is simply waiting for nursing home placement. “Buffing and turfing” (or, simply “turfing”) is an art form. Unfortunately, on Medicine, we are much more often the turf-ee than the turf-er, since we can’t actually refuse admissions. (I’ve become adept at steering them to Neurology, though.) A more broad term is “dump”, which is a transfer of a patient from anywhere (another service, an outside hospital, a nursing home) because they didn’t want to deal with them. Dumps are common on Friday afternoons. Also common on Friday afternoons is the “pop drop”. This is when the caregivers of an elderly patient (often his son or daughter) bring him to the VA ER complaining of dehydration or mental status changes (“he just isn’t himself”). They make sure he is going to be admitted, then mysteriously disappear until Monday morning. (I just put together a glossary for incoming 3rd year students, so I’ve had medical slang on my mind.) Dr. J ---
**Author:** ![oblio212](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ce7236/32.png) [@oblio212](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oblio212)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2016, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/18 "2016-12-14T05:53:40Z")
An old Southern term is “Swamp Goomer”. It is a hillbilly term for a witch, or “Goomer doctor”. [REF: > **[Give Us a Kiss](https://books.google.com/books?id=8HO1pcHk89YC&pg=PT34&lpg=PT34&dq=Swamp%2BGoomers&source=bl&ots=WW1XxuO9bT&sig=7PXnkI5dxgzkOKlEup8Y2ciuNug&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjpkL_U-PLQAhUY-GMKHfwtBEkQ6AEINTAF#v=onepage&q=Swamp%20Goomers&f=false)** > > "My imagination is always skulking about in a wrong place." And now Doyle Redmond, thirty-five-year-old nowhere writer, has crossed the line between imagination and real live trouble. On the lam in his soon-to-be ex-wife's Volvo, he's running a... ] (Sorry about the lengthy link.) Something that you would not want to run into in the swamps. Google needs to learn this term since there is slated to be a lot of swamp draining coming up soon. Swamp Goomers included. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2023, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/19 "2023-10-30T18:44:20Z")
I completely missed this response from this one-hit wonder from seven years ago (thanks, oblio212) right above this post, but it appears that is the context. In one episode Granny tries to rescue (Mr. Drysdale, I think) from some “goomer doctor.” That term does have some history predating “Beverly Hillbillies,” and pretty certainly has no connection to “Gomer.” And from there “Goomer” apparently morphed into a general dismissive term without the “doctor” connotation. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2023, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823/20 "2023-10-30T19:21:25Z")
‘Goomer’ in my neck of the woods means ‘you little dummy’ I had to stop Son-of-a-wrek from calling his sisters that. I tried to verify it wasn’t anything but a term of endearment, with out success. Seems Granny coined it. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/concerning-gomers-goomers-and-goobers/81823.md?page=2)