get your ducks in a row - etymology

Factual Questions
1

anyone care to make me look good for my boss? he asked if I knew the history of the phrase “get your ducks in a row” and the various derivations thereof. I quickly responded that it had something to do with the way a mother duck is followed by a nice neat line of her ducklings, but that I would verify. Phrase does not appear in my Word Origins Bible. Any help?

2

I would guess that it comes from duck weights that are used by old engineers (young ones use autocad ;)) to create a curve. The duck weights held a flexible plastic piece in the right curvature.

Again I don’t know if this is the etymology - your’s sounds good too.

3

I always thought it was a reference to the old shooting games. When the ducks are all lined up, it’s easier to shoot em, and win.

4

According to my Lighter(American Slang), it first apears in print in the 1970’s. This surprises me, but I trust his scholarship. The usage was mostly concerning having your business dealings lined up in methodical order.

And my extensive sources can’t come up with anything else.

5

This site

http://www.geocities.com/colosseum/court/2018/wizzu.html

says it’s a nautical term – though I note they give a bogus origin for “posh.”

This site:

http://www.mindlesscrap.com/origins/moreorigins.htm#D

attributes it to setting up duckpins (a form of bowling), but fails to account for the fact that the phrase appears to have originated in the 1960s/’70s. This site:

http://www.shu.ac.uk/web-admin/phrases/bulletin_board/messages/1474.html

seems to concur.

This site:

http://www.arlington.k12.va.us/schools/barrett/webquest/idioms/bolstaranimals.htm#duck

goes for the shooting gallery explanation.

These guys:

http://www.cableone.net/chane/wtaug/discus/messages/54/54.html

go with the drafting explanation

Way at the bottom of this page:

http://members.aol.com/MorelandC/HaveOriginsData.htm#DucksInARow

you’ll find the duckling behavioral theory.

– Beruang

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“Back in 5 – Godot”

6

It looks like Beruang’s covered the whole nine yards.

7

Good one, beatle. The shooting-gallery explanation sounds much more likely to me.

8

Well, having sat back and let those-brighter-than-I weigh in, I see the issue has not been put to bed with finality(the best ones never are, are they?) but I appreciate the posts, especially Beruang’s survey of the theories on this. Thanks all.

and thanks Bill

9

Wow! That nautical site was a hoot. Here is the quote about ducks

.

Given that laser beans(sic) probably weren’t used much in the 1970’s in the shipbuilding industry, that one is out.

I propose this, after reading my JE Lighter about many uses of the word “duck.”

Duck was certainly used in the military to refer to seamen, in print as recent as the early '60s. Lighter has a letter from a correspondent who served in the military(Army) in 1958 and sent in a note that they used the phrase “all, right, men. Fall in, and line up in a column of ducks.” There was also a quote in a book from 1981, but referring to a person’s military experience in 1951 with the same phrase.

So, I propose the phrase “column of ducks” was not an unusual phrase in the military in the 50’s 60’s and got transferred to civilian use sometime in the 60’s/70’s as “get your ducks in a row.”