Highball,' to Speed

PROFESSOR Bolinger (American Speech, 17: 270) asks for comment on 'Highball, to speed, Feb. 1942.' The word in this sense is not in Webster's (1941), or Funk and Wagnalls' (1935), or the Thorndike Century Senior Dictionary (1941). It is not in Partridge's Slang and Unconventional English (1937) or Farmer and Henley's Slang and Its Analogues (1890-1904). When, however, we turn to American slang dictionaries, we begin picking up the word. Weseen's Dictionary of American Slang (1934) defines it 'To go ahead; a signal to go ahead; a fast freight,' but does not specifically list 'speed.' In Berrey and Van den Bark's American Thesaurus of Slang (1942), 'highball' is fully treated. Its synonyms include 'signal to leave or proceed, also signal to go fast' (verb and noun), 'speed' (verb and noun), 'rapid, quick, fast' (a 'highball' engineer), 'fast train, fast freight, express.' And in his glossary of American slang in Slang To-Day and Yesterday (1934), Partridge defines the noun as 'full-speed signal' and the verb as 'to travel swiftly; to depart, esp. hastily.' It will be evident, I think, that 'highball' is a railroad term. It has three senses which are of especial interest to us: (i) signal to go ahead; (2) signal to go fast; to depart, especially hastily; (3) speed; to speed, to travel swiftly. The first sense is treated in the OED Supplement, which defines it as 'A signal to proceed, given to a locomotive driver by waving the hand above the head. Hence, a clear way, a straight course. U. S.' In support of the extended meaning, it cites the following passages, the first of which is especially pertinent

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