# History of the High-Five, please

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [November 19, 2006, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009 "2006-11-19T05:20:23Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2006, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009/1 "2006-11-19T05:20:23Z")

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Please say what you know about the origin and history of the “High Five.”

Also, should this be in Cafe Society?

-FrL-

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**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2006, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009/2 "2006-11-19T05:44:53Z")

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There are a couple of alleged origins given here:

[http://www.nationalhighfiveday.com/origin.html](http://www.nationalhighfiveday.com/origin.html)

[http://www.outsports.com/baseball/2003/0617glennburke.htm](http://www.outsports.com/baseball/2003/0617glennburke.htm)

However, these don’t seem to me to be correct in terms of dates. I remember doing “slap me five” (I think we also did “high five,” though I am not quite as sure of that) in college in 1970 or 1971, well before the dates given for the spread of “high five”

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**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2006, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009/3 "2006-11-19T06:35:57Z")

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In the entry at [Etymology Online](http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=high-five) , in which the phrase _high five_ itself is dated to 1980, the actual greeting itself is acknowledged to be older and a reference is made to Dick Shawn in The Producers, 1968, as an early example.

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**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2006, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009/4 "2006-11-19T17:21:54Z")

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To elaborate on my previous post, I recall in the early 1970s doing variants of “slap me five” like “slap me high” (identicial to the “high five”) and “slap me low” (with hands held at knee level). Although the actual term “high five” may be more recent, the gesture itself as has been noted surely dates from at least the 1960s.

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**Author:** ![Nothing\_Special](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9f8e36/32.png) [@Nothing\_Special](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nothing_Special)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2006, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/history-of-the-high-five-please/381009/5 "2006-11-19T17:54:59Z")

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“Slap me five” and “Gimme some skin“ go back at least to the very early 70’s, when we white kids were continually imitating and (in)appropriating various things that black people did first. So, it probably goes back to the late 60’s. The gesture was one palm out for a good thing done, two out for a real good thing done. If the slap-er declined, perhaps you weren’t as good as you thought you were.

The High Five evolved from this gradually, first at mid-torso level, then up until people jumped up in the air with hands at full stretch. It was just a matter of carrying it to each (il)logical extreme, which happened pretty fast. Forearm and chest/head-thumping were soon to follow.