[Histonet] My bit of trivia for today - True Blue

[Loralei Dewe]

That's pretty cool!!!  I never knew...

Loralei

On Mon, Nov 7, 2011 at 10:09 AM, Morken, Timothy <
Timothy.Morken <@t> ucsfmedctr.org> wrote:

> I was listening to the Wait Wait Don't Tell Me radio show this weekend and
> they had to come up with the derivation of "True Blue" as a saying. Turns
> out it had to do with blue dye colorfastness. Later they would call it Fast
> Blue - but that does not convey the later meaning of the phrase..
>
>
> 'True blue' is supposed to derive from the blue cloth that was made at
> Coventry, England in the late middle ages. The town's dyers had a
> reputation for producing material that didn't fade with washing, i.e. it
> remained 'fast' or 'true'. The phrase 'as true as Coventry blue' originated
> then and is still used (in Coventry at least). The town's standing was
> recorded in 1670 by John Ray in the first edition of A Compleat Collection
> of English Proverbs:
>
> "Coventry had formerly the reputation for dying of blues; insomuch that
> true blue became a Proverb to signifie one that was always the same and
> like himself."
>
>
> Tim Morken
> Supervisor, Histology, IPOX
> UC San Francisco Medical Center
> Box 1656
> 1600 Divisidero St, B217
> San Francisco, CA 94115
> USA
>
> 415.514.6042 (office)
> 415.885.7409 Fax
> tim.morken <@t> ucsfmedctr.org<mailto:tim.morken <@t> ucsfmedctr.org>
>
>
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