[PocketLJ] thought...

[katster]

where does the expression "the whole nine yards" come from?

Darn me for having a writer's ear...

Comments

It's not known exactly

[sscougall.livejournal.com]

I always thought it referred to American football, but apparently it doesn't.

Check out these links for some more details:
http://www.uselessknowledge.com/word/yards.shtml
http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/19981012.html

[tropism.livejournal.com]

From what I've heard, it comes from WWII, where one of the premier fighters of the day ... I can't recall which, exactly, maybe the Mustang...took a 9-yard-long belt of ammunition for its machine guns. When you gave the it the whole nine yards, you expended all your ammo on the target...usually reserved for juicy strafing runs, I guess. ;)

Re: It's not known exactly

[tropism.livejournal.com]

I just looked over those sites...and frankly, really, the only one that makes sense is the airplane explanation. While they say that the amountof ammunition is not measured in length but in rounds or weight, yeah, but you're always gonna be loading the same length of ammo into a plane, and nothing that it's X yards long is something I can't see a person -not- doing, after loading plane after plane after plane. ;)

[primis.livejournal.com]

This is correct.

It's a reference to belt-fed ammunition.

"Bought the farm" is also a fighter-plane reference, because when a plane went down into a farmer's yard, the gov't had to essentially buy the land from the owner(s) as compensation.

I'm full of random useless info, and little else....


-- Primis.