[ExI] Is tobacco really harmful?

BillK pharos at gmail.com
Mon Nov 23 23:32:13 UTC 2009


On 11/23/09, Robert Masters wrote:
>  BillK wrote:
>  <<Since about 1890 people have recognized that cigarette smoking does
>  indeed damage one's health for even then they said that each cigarette
>  a person smoked drove another nail in his coffin. That led to a
>  cigarette being called ( in slang ) a coffin nail.>>
>
>
> Thanks, that's what I wanted to know.  But do you have a source for that?
>
>


Google??

The dictionaries say 'Many references' e.g. newspapers, stories, etc.
For example:
<http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-628887.html>
Quote:
"Say, sport, have you got a coffin nail on you?" asks a character in
an O. Henry short story written in 1906. The New Dictionary of
American Slang dates the phrase "coffin nail" from the late 19th
century.


BillK



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