# Who's Trippin' Down the Streets of That \[Windy\] City **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [March 1, 2010, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whos-trippin-down-the-streets-of-that-windy-city/530877 "2010-03-01T16:55:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2010, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whos-trippin-down-the-streets-of-that-windy-city/530877/1 "2010-03-01T16:55:32Z")
Cecil’s column about the origins of the nicknames [Big Apple and the Windy City](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/244/why-cant-cecil-get-his-facts-straight-about-the-origin-of-big-apple-and-mention-john-j-fitz-gerald) cries out for any more recent updatings, so I’m starting a thread to put findings in. But one thing just astounded me. And no, it wasn’t something Cecil wrote. He got it right. It was Barry Popik who dropped my jaw. > [@](#): > > “We can now say that ‘Windy City’ was born in 1885 and was popularized in 1886,” he writes. What? Just because he happened to find an early cite he made the astonishing - and as it proved, thoroughly wrong - claim that it must be the first? I can’t believe that anybody in the origin game would make a mistake of that magnitude. Anyway, while we’re waiting for the experts I throw my little bombshell into the arena. I’m sure it’s been found by now but here’s a quote that pushes the starting gate all the way back to 1860! Milwaukee Daily Sentinel - July 4, 1860, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, page 1 > [@](#): > > We’re proud of Milwaukee because she is not overrun with a lazy police force as is Chicago - because her morals are better, he[sic] criminals fewer, her credit better, and her taxes lighter in proportion to her valuation than Chicago, the windy city of the West. However, that article seems to be credited to the La Crosse Union and Democrat. I wouldn’t dare make any such foolish claim as that it was first! ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2010, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whos-trippin-down-the-streets-of-that-windy-city/530877/2 "2010-03-01T22:07:54Z")
Barry Popick is likely wailing and gnashing his teeth at this moment, thanks to you Exapno. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2010, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whos-trippin-down-the-streets-of-that-windy-city/530877/3 "2010-03-02T13:29:49Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Cecil’s column about the origins of the nicknames [Big Apple and the Windy City](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/244/why-cant-cecil-get-his-facts-straight-about-the-origin-of-big-apple-and-mention-john-j-fitz-gerald) > [@](#): > > Anyway, while we’re waiting for the experts I throw my little bombshell into the arena. I’m sure it’s been found by now but here’s a quote that pushes the starting gate all the way back to 1860! . No need to actually search for this yourself. Barry actually had that one quite a few years back and has antedated it twice since then. To keep yourself up to date, just visit his website Barry Popik and you can search for just about any word you’ve ever wondered about. No one works harder to find word origins than Barry Popik. And, he did most of his work the old-fashioned way, actually reading the newspapers in libraries. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2010, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whos-trippin-down-the-streets-of-that-windy-city/530877/4 "2010-03-02T13:55:36Z")
Since it popped up so easily on Newspaper Archive I was sure, as I said, that someone had noticed it before. (Although they do keep adding newspapers.) I wanted to make sure that people here saw it. But I remain amazed that Popik (of all people, to use a Safireism) could say that it was born in 1885. I would have thought that nobody researching origins would ever say that unless a coinage was being acknowledged.