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Why You Say It
The Fascinating Stories Behind Over 600 Everyday Words and Phrases
by Webb Garrison
Published by Rutledge Hill Press
BLURB
American humorist Gelett Burgess was once more widely known than was Charles W. Fairbanks—the Hoosier who spent eight years as vice president under the shadow of Teddy Roosevelt.
Burgess, who was never more than a minute in any man's shadow, delighted readers and listeners throughout the 1920s and 1930s. Some of his gags were so preposterous that at first they were taken seriously.
Poking fun at techniques used by advertisers, Burgess prepared a dummy book jacket for use at a publisher's convention. He stole a sketch of a lovely young woman and displayed it prominately. Beneath the picture he put a brief endorsement of the book by "Miss Belinda Blurb."
His prank was so successful that the humorist is credited with getting an artificial word in the English language, single-handedly. Soon after Belinda Blurb's fake enthusiasm was circulated in 1907, any short but laudatory notice of a book, a record, a song, or a car came to be known as an advertising blurb.
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