# How long has the term "Bucket List" been around? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 3, 2014, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372 "2014-09-03T15:28:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/1 "2014-09-03T15:28:17Z")
The first time I heard the term was when that Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman film came out a few years ago. Now I see it everywhere. I don’t think its confirmation bias because I think I would have remembered a term like “Bucket List” used and looked it up. I thought it was just an attempt at a clever movie title but it can’t have caught on that quickly, could it? ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/2 "2014-09-03T15:38:13Z")
Google ngrams has it appearing in [1960](https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=bucket+list&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cbucket%20list%3B%2Cc0) ETA: The first few results don’t use it in the idiomatic sense, and I don’t have the patience searching for the first such use, so this is definitely not evidence that that use started at that time. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/3 "2014-09-03T15:48:47Z")
Screenwriter Justin Zackham coined the phrase for the screenplay that became the movie. However, it’s just a play on the phrase “kick the bucket” which has been around for hundreds of years. It shows up sporadically before the movie, which doesn’t necessarily mean that Justin Zackham stole it from an earlier reference. It’s more likely a case where different people created the same phrase independently. The movie very much popularized the phrase though, and you can thank it for pretty much all of the modern usage of the phrase. This Slate article cites a 2004 reference in the same context, and lists earlier usage of the phrase with a different meaning (a bucket list in computer programming, which has nothing to do with the type of list in the movie, for example). > **[When Did People Start Saying “Bucket List”?](https://slate.com/culture/2011/11/bucket-list-what-s-the-origin-of-the-term.html)** > > Update, May 29, 2015: Vocabulary.com executive editor Ben Zimmer considered the origins and evolution of the term bucket list in a May 29, 2015, Wall... ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/4 "2014-09-03T15:58:12Z")
So why does kick the bucket mean to die? ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/5 "2014-09-03T16:20:18Z")
> [@Si\_Amigo](#): > > So why does kick the bucket mean to die? The origin of the phrase isn’t clear. The wikipedia page discusses several theories. > **[Kick the bucket](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kick_the_bucket)** > > To kick the bucket is an English idiom considered a euphemistic, informal, or slang term meaning "to die". Its origin remains unclear, though there have been several theories. > A common theory is that the idiom refers to hanging, either as a method of execution or suicide. However, the actual origin of the idiom is a matter of dispute. Its earliest appearance is in the Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1785), where it is defined as "to die". In John Badcock's slang dictionary of 1823, the explanat... ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/6 "2014-09-03T16:24:56Z")
I have yet to read any of the links and their versions of what “kick the bucket” means, but I have always visualized somebody preparing to hang himself / herself by standing on a bucket and when the moment of truth arrives, just kicking the bucket aside and starting the dangling process. If that’s not among the options in the cited material, I’ll learn the “truth” later. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/7 "2014-09-03T16:30:07Z")
> [@Si\_Amigo](#): > > So why does kick the bucket mean to die? [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/h57UR-oIE_g/hqdefault.jpg "It`s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (Duranty Kicks the Bucket )") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h57UR-oIE_g) ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/8 "2014-09-03T16:47:36Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > Screenwriter Justin Zackham coined the phrase for the screenplay that became the movie. I’m actually quite surprised by that. I could swear the phrase was being used in the early '00s, maybe around 2001-2003. My recollection is first encountering the phrase while I was living abroad, and that ended late 2003. But darn it if I can’t find any email reference or anything definite relating to the phrase antedating the Zackham movie (which I never knew existed until this thread.) But memory is a funny thing, so I really don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/9 "2014-09-03T17:10:36Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > The movie very much popularized the phrase though, and you can thank it for pretty much all of the modern usage of the phrase. Wow that’s surprising. I don’t remember it for having been a very good or high grossing movie ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/10 "2014-09-03T17:13:59Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > Wow that’s surprising. I don’t remember it for having been a very good or high grossing movie It doesn’t have to be, for its title to have gained widespread recognition (see _Snakes on a Plane_). ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/11 "2014-09-03T18:22:51Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > It doesn’t have to be, for its title to have gained widespread recognition (see _Snakes on a Plane_). Yep, I never saw it, but I saw plenty of trailers for it. And all of them mentioned that a bucket list is a list of things to do before you kick the bucket. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/12 "2014-09-03T18:24:19Z")
They say when Colonel Sanders died, they had a “kick the bucket” sale. (I heard that joke in the 70’s just after he died.) ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2014, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-has-the-term-bucket-list-been-around/697372/13 "2014-09-03T18:50:57Z")
Here’s a very poor use of the term in an ad: [What Were They Thinking?! Malaysia Airlines Launches a Things to Do Before You Die Contest](https://www.yahoo.com/travel/malaysia-airlines-launches-morbid-bucket-list-contest-96538947582.html)