What was "the T.L." in 1940?

[scottp]

If I'm hearing it right...
Gracie Allen et al are pestering George Burns about a "Kiddie" themed party and he says, "I'll give you the T.L.-- I'm NOT going!"
Googling revealed a more modern item-- "I'll give you the tl:dr version..." meaning Too Long:Didn't Read.
Today, "the D.L." means "the Down Low" (the accurate info) and I don't know how far back that goes. (It used to be "the Low Down"...)
And I don't think George said D.L., but maybe.

[Yhtapmys]

If I'm hearing it right...
Gracie Allen et al are pestering George Burns about a "Kiddie" themed party and he says, "I'll give you the T.L.-- I'm NOT going!"
Googling revealed a more modern item-- "I'll give you the tl:dr version..." meaning Too Long:Didn't Read.
Today, "the D.L." means "the Down Low" (the accurate info) and I don't know how far back that goes. (It used to be "the Low Down"...)
And I don't think George said D.L., but maybe.

It'd help to know the date of the show.

Yhtapmys

[scottp]

The listing that came with the disk shows "Kiddie Party" as July 29, 1940.

Not long after the switch from Hinds to Hormel/Spam.

[JohnM]

I have no idea, but after looking at a list of acronym definitions for TL (I think we can rule out "Transport Layer"), I would guess either "Tough Luck" or "Tough Love".

[Moose Hatrack]

Wait a minute JohnM... maybe you have something there with "Tough Luck"?

[Maxwell]

Wait a minute JohnM... maybe you have something there with "Tough Luck"?

It certainly wouldn't have been "tough love." That expression is so 40 years later.

[Yhtapmys]

I was hoping to find the show on-line somewhere to hear it and see if it was in context with something earlier, but no such luck.

What's a little surprising is Burns and Allen were on during the summer instead of on hiatus with a summer replacement.

Yhtapmys

[JohnM]

Wait a minute JohnM... maybe you have something there with "Tough Luck"?

It certainly wouldn't have been "tough love." That expression is so 40 years later.

Yeah, that's true.

[scottp]

Then on October 7, 1940 "George Dresses as a Woman"-- he's telling of being "taken for a ride" by a notorious gangster in the previous episode.
Someone blows a line on the way to asking how he got home after being dropped off, and George says, "I walked home-- and I'll have a T.L. for you later."

[JohnM]

The plot thickens...

[shimp scrampi]

Hey kids -

Methinks it's for "Trade-Last", an outdated term that roughly equates in comedy to a "topper", or the "last word" on something...

Check it out: http://www.jstor.org/pss/454748

[JohnM]

Shimp, I think you got it. Although your definition for the term "in comedy" sounds like an ironic twist on the meaning given in that article. Makes sense, though.

[shimp scrampi]

Yeah, I have a little trouble defining this with precision as well, but it seems in the neighborhood of a backhanded compliment, typical of B&A material. I don't know how many of you all have access to the full article on JSTOR, but it actually references the term's use on Burns and Allen:

American Speech 12 (1937): 76 prints a letter from Mamie Meredith in which she reviews the documentation of trade-last to date, pointing out that "Gracie Allen's frequent employment of it on the radio has ... brought it to public notice recently." Meredith laments the fact that "trade-last is not defined in dictionaries, English or American," and adds, with understandable reservations, "An explanation I have heard, though it does not sound convincing, is that the term derives from shoemakers. When shoes were made by hand the cobbler found it convenient to borrow lasts from friendly competitors." She notes in closing that the abbreviated form TL is still used by the younger generation, at least in rural Nebraska.

And, one more amusing quote from the article, hoping I'm not pushing the fair-use boundaries:

I found a possible explanation of the real origin of the expression, and a very curious one. In a discussion of Jewish terms used among shoe salesmen as reported by David Geller . . . [American Speech 9 (1934): 283-86], T.L. is said to serve as an abbreviation for the Jewish tochos lekker (backside kisser)." Fleece apparently did not consult David Geller's original article. The terms discussed in the article are not exclusively Jewish, as he believes, and TL does not appear in the article at all but in Addenda compiled by J. S. Fox (p. 286). Fleece concludes, "There is certainly a definite relation between the two uses of T.L., as the childish offer to trade compliments is certainly a naive form of 'apple-polishing.' Tochos lekker is at least as good as 'trade last,' as an explanation of the children's T.L. The vulgarity of the Jewish term would also explain the abbreviation to the initial letters, a rather unusual form."

[scottp]

I can only read the first page of the cited article, and the later excerpt. There were many examples of compliments on the B&A shows in that period, often ending with George saying "Thank you" and Gracie immediately following with "Thankyouuuu!"
And I'm fascinated with the third-party aspect mentioned in that first page.

But where George is refusing to attend the Kiddie Party, it seems to be the equivalent of "absolutely, positively." In the "taken for a ride by a gangster" example, maybe if I listen to the bit again I'll find compliments-- for one thing, when George dressed as "Aunt Clara" to confuse the gangster, the gangster took a liking to "her."

In another show Gracie tried to pass off a kangaroo (mascot of her "Surprise Party" presidential campaign) as Aunt Clara too.

The explanation about a shoemaker's last (foot-shaped form) seems like QUITE a reach.

[scottp]

I just found another one, from 11/25/40, "Rehearsing next week's show"-- as set-up, Artie Shaw had retired for a brief time, in Mexico, and when he came to the B&A show there was a guitarist called "Senor Lee" on the order of Remley, I suppose-- if there was such a musician in the band, it was probably an actor "playing the wacky character" who mangled the English language.
George says to Artie, "I have a T.L. for you and that Senor Lee..." and he proceeds to complain that in the previous show, they talked over his one good joke... "... why couldn't you wait until I got my laugh?"
Senor Lee answers, "What, and miss the Crosby show?"

In this case T.L. appears where one might expect "a bone to pick." A very inconsistent pattern. That article says Gracie was using it on the radio, but all three examples I've heard are from George.