# Origins of current catchphrases **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 15, 2001, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873 "2001-06-15T01:18:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/41 "2003-04-12T17:40:14Z")
The question that bothers me is “Why did I even know that Peter Bergman was a doctor on a soap opera?”. The only time that I ever kept up with the plot of any soap opera was when my mother was watching _General Hospital_ a lot and frequently talking about the show. I can’t think of any time when I would ever have seen Peter Bergman playing a doctor on _All My Children_. And yet somehow I remember that advertisement and have morphed it mentally to have one of the doctors from _General Hospital_ be in it. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/42 "2003-04-12T18:00:28Z")
**Wendell Wagner** is correct, Robert Young did not do the “I’m not a doctor, but I play one on TV” ads. Robert Young did schill Sanka decaf coffee for several years on TV. Typically, he would notice a friend acting irritable, and ask, “What’s the matter, Tom, caffeine bothering you?” ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/43 "2003-04-12T18:11:38Z")
Herb Morrison, a reporter for WLS Radio in Chicago, was covering the landing of the Geman dirigible _Hindenburg_ in Lakehurst, New Jersey, on May 6, 1937, when it burst into flame. His words: > [@](#): > > It’s crashing! It’s crashing terrible! Oh, my, get out of the way, please. It’s bursting into flames! And it’s falling on the mooring mast. All the folks agree this is terrible, one of the worst catastrophes in the world. Oh, the flames, four or five hundred feet in the sky. It’s a teriffic crash, ladies and gentlemen. The smoke and the flames now, and the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring mast. Oh, the humanity! And all the passengers! ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/44 "2003-04-12T18:17:13Z")
Herb Morrison, a reporter for WLS Radio in Chicago, was covering the landing of the Geman dirigible _Hindenburg_ in Lakehurst, New Jersey, on May 6, 1937, when it burst into flame. His words: > [@](#): > > It’s crashing! It’s crashing terrible! Oh, my, get out of the way, please. It’s bursting into flames! And it’s falling on the mooring mast. All the folks agree this is terrible, one of the worst catastrophes in the world. Oh, the flames, four or five hundred feet in the sky. It’s a teriffic crash, ladies and gentlemen. The smoke and the flames now, and the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring mast. Oh, the humanity! And all the passengers! ---
**Author:** ![tonbo0422](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b5e925/32.png) [@tonbo0422](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tonbo0422)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/45 "2003-04-12T19:31:04Z")
Wendell, You’re right! I must check the new level of plaques on my brain surface. However, Robert Young DID play doctor in millions of commercials, if memory serves me correctly. Well, not millions, but a series of “decaffeinated” commercials, at least. Link at [http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/Y/htmlY/youngrobert/youngrobert.htm](http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/Y/htmlY/youngrobert/youngrobert.htm) ---
**Author:** ![bradwalt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@bradwalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bradwalt)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/46 "2003-04-12T20:02:49Z")
Start arguments with this one, because it’s much more recent than most people would think: “It’s not over until the fat lady sings.” Dates back only to the 1980s I think. Im sure that’s in a Cecil column somewhere! Most people would guess it goes back a century or so! ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/47 "2003-04-12T20:08:36Z")
Robert Young never played a doctor on television commercials. There is a rule (either FCC or National Association of Broadcasters) against doctors, or actors dressed as doctors, endorsing products on American television commercials. Young always appeared in street clothes on the Sanka commercials, and if memory serves me, his “friends” on the commercials always addressed him as Bob. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/48 "2003-04-12T20:12:21Z")
[Oh, the humanity!](http://www.lakehurst.navy.mil/nlweb/hindenb.html) - Audiovisual link at the bottom of the page. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/49 "2003-04-12T20:42:36Z")
[San Antonio sportscaster Dan Cook](http://www.co.fairfax.va.us/library/faq/sports.htm) seems to have _popularized_ the expression “It ain’t over til the fat lady sings” about 25 years ago: > [@](#): > > \*\*The opera ain’t over til the fat lady sings. > > DAN COOK, sports broadcaster and writer for the San Antonio (Texas) Express-News, on television newscast in April 1978, after the first basketball game between the San Antonio Spurs and the Washington Bullets, to illustrate that while the Spurs had won once, the series was not over yet. Bullets coach Dick Motta borrowed the phrase later during the Bullet’s eventually successful championship drive, and it became widely known and was often mistakenly attributed to him.–The Washington Post, June 11, 1978, p. D6. Cook may well have said isn’t, but this remark is generally heard with ain’t.\*\* [An alternative take](http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-ita1.htm): > [@](#): > > **It’s usually taken to be a reference to opera, so many performances of which seem to end with a set-piece aria by a well-built soprano, but its recent links are mainly with sport, so much so that some people think that is the origin. > Commentators do often say the phrase to remind people that it’s the final result that matters, often in a spirit of reassurance to the supporters of the losing team. It has been suggested that it was the brainchild of the San Antonio TV sports editor Dan Cook. It’s probably not one of Yogi Berra’s phrases, though it has the same sense and much of the style of his “It ain’t over till it’s over”, which he is said to have coined in 1973. > These comparatively recent sports’ associations disguise the fact that it is actually a rather older expression, which occurs in several forms: “It ain’t over till the fat lady sings”, “The opera isn’t over until the fat lady sings”, or “Church ain’t out ’till the fat lady sings”. > This last version appears in a 1976 booklet entitled Southern Words and Sayings. Ralph Keyes wrote a book with the title Nice Guys Finish Seventh in which he says that several informants recalled hearing the expression for decades before it suddenly became nationally known in 1978. The use of church here suggests that its origin wasn’t tied to opera, either, but to church-going.** ---
**Author:** ![tonbo0422](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b5e925/32.png) [@tonbo0422](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tonbo0422)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/50 "2003-04-12T21:19:08Z")
Oh, the humanity! My Dr. Welby bubble has been well and truly burst. I am now officially old. ---
**Author:** ![bradwalt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@bradwalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bradwalt)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/51 "2003-04-12T21:30:20Z")
But maybe this thread will revive the career of PETER BERGMAN, who, according to [imdb.com](http://imdb.com), is famous for the phrase “I’m not a doctor, but I play one on TV” circa 1986, for a “cough medicine”. Still no answers on the product’s brand ? ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/52 "2003-04-13T00:19:48Z")
_Vicks_, according to [http://216.239.57.100/search?q=cache:aLgy8noe9z0C:www.tcf.ua.edu/ScreenSite/res/Library/ImNotADoctor.pdf+"cough+medicine"+commercial+doctor+tv&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://216.239.57.100/search?q=cache:aLgy8noe9z0C:www.tcf.ua.edu/ScreenSite/res/Library/ImNotADoctor.pdf+%22cough+medicine%22+commercial+doctor+tv&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/53 "2003-04-13T00:23:49Z")
And I screwed up the link.[http://216.239.57.100/search?q=cache:aLgy8noe9z0C:www.tcf.ua.edu/ScreenSite/res/Library/ImNotADoctor.pdf+"cough+medicine"+commercial+doctor+tv&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://216.239.57.100/search?q=cache:aLgy8noe9z0C:www.tcf.ua.edu/ScreenSite/res/Library/ImNotADoctor.pdf+%22cough+medicine%22+commercial+doctor+tv&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/54 "2003-04-13T00:27:49Z")
Let’s try the PDF version [http://www.tcf.ua.edu/ScreenSite/res/Library/ImNotADoctor.pdf](http://www.tcf.ua.edu/ScreenSite/res/Library/ImNotADoctor.pdf) ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/55 "2003-04-13T00:41:38Z")
“I could tell ya’, but then I’d have to kill ya’…” I thought that’s what Col. Flagg told Radar at one time. Had to do with retrieving a capsule w/a phone # he’d swallowed, I think. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/56 "2003-04-13T16:09:44Z")
> [@](#): > > “I could tell ya’, but then I’d have to kill ya’…” That one appears for sure in _Top Gun_ and is spoken by Tom Cruise. I think the Col. Flagg/MASH attribution is one of those things that people think they remember, but don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Tusculan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecd19e/32.png) [@Tusculan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tusculan)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/57 "2003-04-13T16:48:48Z")
**Teminus Est, Walloon, Linus van Pelt** , thank you for enlightening me. I watched the video clip. Even after all those years, and knowing the photograph of the burning, it is still shocking to see that clip. ---
**Author:** ![carlotta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@carlotta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carlotta)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/58 "2003-04-13T19:53:27Z")
Have to throw in my bit on “makes the baby Jesus cry” I first came across this phrase in Rebecca Well’s _Little Altars Everywhere_ (prequel to the better known _Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood_)–something adults would say to Catholic children to get them to stop some behavior. I asked my (Catholic) parents about this phrase. My mother had not heard it. She grew up in New York. My father had-he grew up in Florida. Sample sentence: “Joseph stop teasing your sister! Don’t you know that makes the baby Jesus cry!?” So my guess is it was a Southern phrase, possibly only Catholic, during at least the 40s and 50s and was not used ironically until recently. ---
**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:** [April 13, 2003, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873/59 "2003-04-13T22:33:03Z")
_Gli angeli piangono quando ti tocchi_. —Federico Fellini, _Amarcord_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origins-of-current-catchphrases/68873.md?page=2)