# Three cheers and a tiger?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 13, 2003, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557 "2003-06-13T13:51:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![RiverRunner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/977dab/32.png) [@RiverRunner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RiverRunner)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2003, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557/1 "2003-06-13T13:51:09Z")

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Last night I was searching for a .WAV sound clip from a Bugs Bunny cartoon. The clip I’m after is of a genie (from Aladdin’s lamp, of course) saying, “Three cheers and a tiger for me!”

I never found the clip, but I got curious about the phrase. Googling on it got me a reference to [this site](http://www.hyperdictionary.com/dictionary/Tiger) , which includes in the definition for “Tiger:”  
\*4. A kind of growl or screech, after cheering; as, three  
cheers and a tiger. [Colloq. U. S.]  
\*  
Now, I’m from the U.S., and I’m as colloq. as you can get, but this is a new one on me. To what are they referring? Is it something along the lines of, “Rah! Rah! Rah! Grrrrrr!” Has anyone heard this before?  
RR

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**Author:** ![Ice\_Wolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@Ice\_Wolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ice_Wolf)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2003, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557/2 "2003-06-13T14:16:28Z")

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[From this page:](http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Woods/3501/newpage41.htm)

> [@](#):
>
> when “Three cheers and a tiger” was called for, there is division as to what that represented. There is no apparent dispute that the first portion - the “Three cheers” - represented three “Hurrahs!”. The “tiger” portion of that is argued as either a growl from the crowd, slowly rising in volume and pitch until it became a roar of approbation; while others contend that it the addition of the chant “Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi!” at the end of the third “Hurrah!”, the series of “Hi!”'s also rising in both volume and pitch.

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**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2003, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557/3 "2003-06-13T14:40:13Z")

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You aren’t familar with it because the phrase is very dated. It was common in the 20s and 30s, but has died out in everyday use since then, sort of like “23 skiddoo” (though that’s famous enough that people still know about it, though they’d never use it themselves).

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**Author:** ![RiverRunner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/977dab/32.png) [@RiverRunner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RiverRunner)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2003, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557/4 "2003-06-13T17:37:20Z")

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Thanks for the responses. I love the link, **Ice Wolf**. I noticed on thatpage there was a reference to a phrase I first ran across in a Terry Pratchett book: “to see the elephant.” I need to reread the book – _Witches Abroad_, I think – and check up on it. I think TP may have used the phrase incorrectly, which would be unusual.  
RR

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**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2003, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557/5 "2003-06-13T21:11:27Z")

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Someone had an add-a-puss complex.

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**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2003, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-cheers-and-a-tiger/181557/6 "2003-06-13T21:54:43Z")

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**funeefarmer** posted a link and quoted from it [in this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=13609).