# Use of "zilch" as a verb--librarians? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 4, 2013, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024 "2013-09-04T20:45:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![whc.03grady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a6a055/32.png) [@whc.03grady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whc.03grady)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024/1 "2013-09-04T20:45:23Z")
“…Kroch’s gave me a good bargain and sent down between three hundred and four hundred books…on the most varied subjects. Carefully…I classified them and zilched them.” _Life plus 99 Years_ (1958), Nathan F. Leopold, Jr. I supposed “zilched” in this case means “processed” or “readied” or whatever, but does anyone else have a guess? ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024/2 "2013-09-04T21:10:57Z")
Moved Cafe Society --\> MPSIMS. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2013, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024/3 "2013-09-04T21:19:58Z")
The OED does not seem to know of any such usage. It does show a verbal usage of “zilch”, but that is in a sporting context: “To prevent (the opposition) from scoring; to defeat.” I wonder if it could mean “I zeroed them”, with _zeroed_ perhaps meaning something like “marked them in the records as having been borrowed zero times, as yet”. Just a WAG. ---
**Author:** ![Lasciel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e79b87/32.png) [@Lasciel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lasciel)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2013, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024/4 "2013-09-05T18:45:39Z")
As a sarcastic librarian, who sees donations all the time of the most useless varieties, I immediately jump to the ironic interpretation: “This company sent me a freaking cartload of worthless shit. I did my diligence, checked that they were actually worthless shit, and after confirmation, dumped them all.” Otherwise, the above interpretations of marking them as zero circulations seems logical, except that physical card catalog records generally worked on the assumption that a new item started at zero, and so it wouldn’t expressly need to be marked. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2013, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024/5 "2013-09-06T01:29:13Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > The OED does not seem to know of any such usage. It does show a verbal usage of “zilch”, but that is in a sporting context: “To prevent (the opposition) from scoring; to defeat.” The three examples in the current online OED are– > [@OED](#): > > U.S. slang. > > trans. Sport. To prevent (the opposition) from scoring; to defeat. Also transf. > > 1969 Current Slang (Univ. S. Dakota) Winter 12 Zilch, to hold scoreless; to shut out… High school and college females, Ohio… We zilched them on that rubber. > > 1980 Hunting Ann. 1981 55/1 This requires the hunter to decide in advance whether he wants to hunt with an antique or modern… There is no going out later using a scoped rifle after getting zilched with a smokepole. > > 1990 USA Today 2 Apr. (Life section) 20/7 My favorite film of 1989 got zilched… That would be Field of Dreams. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2013, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-zilch-as-a-verb-librarians/668024/6 "2013-09-06T02:16:40Z")
In case anyone didn’t recognize the name, it’s Nathan Leopold of “Leopold and Loeb.” Also, the book was co-written by “Perry Mason” creator Erle Stanley Gardner. It’s not obvious what it means. Kroch’s was a Chicago bookstore, which later merged with Brentanos. It sounds like he’s saying that he got a bunch of books and read them all, although how that ties in with ‘zilched’ is the puzzle. Maybe he means that there were none left unread after he had finished.