Chrysti The Wordsmith: City Slicker - 2

Greetings This is Christie the wordsmith. When Mr. Reilly asked me about the origin of the term city slicker on behalf of his creative writing students at Cody Senior High in Wyoming I too became curious about this moniker. Of course most westerners know this term as a slightly disparaging nickname for a sophisticated stylish city dweller but where does the slicker part come from. The Dictionary of American Slang published in 1960 provides some tantalizing information on the slang usage of slicker it notes that the American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald was a big fan of the word and in his 1920 novel This Side of Paradise it appears 15 times. Here's how Fitzgerald explained a slicker of the 1920s. He was good looking. He had brains and he used all means to get ahead be popular and never in trouble. He derived his name from the fact that his hair was cut short soaked in tonic parted in the middle and slicked back as the current fashion indicated.

So if F. Scott Fitzgerald is to be believed a hairstyle inspired the coinage city slicker the moniker of someone who you say arrives in a small town wearing fashionable expensive togs the kind not fit for rural living. He might also sport a high maintenance hairstyle which in the 1920s required oils and tonics for a slicked back or slicker heard. Look. I'm Christie the wordsmith from Montana State University in Bozeman Christie the wordsmith is sponsored by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Zoot enterprises a high tech firm in Bozeman Montana offering challenging careers and innovative solutions for the financial services industry. Zoot web dot com.