# Looking for a picture of M. Herrick's Uncle Oscar (Oscar Award's namesake)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-a-picture-of-m-herricks-uncle-oscar-oscar-awards-namesake/59264>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 24, 2001, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-a-picture-of-m-herricks-uncle-oscar-oscar-awards-namesake/59264 "2001-03-24T02:33:12Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\
**Post date:** [March 24, 2001, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-a-picture-of-m-herricks-uncle-oscar-oscar-awards-namesake/59264/1 "2001-03-24T02:33:12Z")

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The oft-told tale of how the Oscar got its name is that an Academy employee, Margaret Herrick (later the executive director of the Academy), said that the statue looked like her uncle Oscar. This is the story **C K Dexter Haven** repeats in the Staff Report [Why is the Oscar called the Oscar?](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/moscar.html) The Academy itself doesn’t seem so sure that the story is true: [Academy Award of Merit](http://www3.oscars.org/academy/awards/oscar.html)

Did Margaret Herrick really have an Uncle Oscar? Did the statue really look like him? I searched for one, but I couldn’t find a picture of her Uncle Oscar.

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**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\
**Post date:** [March 25, 2001, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-a-picture-of-m-herricks-uncle-oscar-oscar-awards-namesake/59264/2 "2001-03-25T03:53:54Z")

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**bib** I’m sure, knowing you, that you have read about everything available on the subject(origin of term basically unknown, etc.).

If you didn’t stumble across it, I thought you might find this interesting

> [@](#):
>
> In a 1959 letter to a Merriam-Webster editor, Mrs. Herrick admitted:
> 
> Unfortunately, I must confess to having named the Oscar in 1931 in a thoughtless quip about an uncle of my mother’s whom I have never met. I have regretted it more times than I care to remember because the family seemed strangely devoid of humor in relation to the distant uncle, and I have always felt that the Academy loses something in dignity every time the statuette is referred to as Oscar.

from [here](http://www.m-w.com/whist/oscar.htm)  
I know it answers nothing, but it was one of the few new twists to the story that I found.