The word "hello" was not recorded in dictionaries until 1883. There's disagreement over its origins and when exactly it became widely used, but apparently its popularization as the standard greeting of American English coincided with the rise of the telephone in the 1870s and 1880s.Alexander Graham Bell, however, preferred "Ahoy!" as the standard telephone greeting. Didn't work out.
10 comments:
During the first world war, Germans would answer with "God punish England?"
To which the standard reply was "God is punishing England."
It's a shame that went out.
i'm adopting "ahoy!"
seriously.
me too
or maybe "god punish england?" i like them both.
i remember on one episode of the simpsons, mr. burns decided he would start answering his own phone. because he's really old, he would pick up and say, "ahoy-hoy!" i took it up for a while, apparently not really getting the joke.
i was already pretty ashamed of that. thanks for adding to it.
Justin, I called you this afternoon and you answered "What's up, man?"
Justin, you're a LIAR.
I *am* aren't I?
Old habits are hard to break.
benji, the more that i think about this, the more that it really scares me.
What is it that scares you? The Hello Kitty tailpipe? That was what Google Image gave me. Non-standard telephone greetings? Don't be scared. Justin being a LIAR? That's scary in a subtle way, I guess.
I'm scared to know how quickly the word "hello" went from being nothing at all to one of the dominant words of the english language (spawning dominant variations in most other languages too - hola being the best example - a general greeting not just used on the phone). I mean, I guess the phone is pretty darned revolutionary, but still, it scares me a little bit.
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