Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2014 November 9

= November 9 =

US wartime abbreviation
[Inspired by a question on RD/M]. In the attached poster (from our Recycling article), what does "C-H" stand for? Tevildo (talk) 12:49, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * [[File:Follow the oldtimer's advice. Handle tools carefully. Prevent accidents. Avoid spoilage. Come on. C-H... Do more... - NARA - 535034.jpg|150px|thumb]] I don't know (yet), but note that the same couplet(?) appears at the bottom of another WWII poster on Commons, appended at right, as well as this one and this one. Deor (talk) 13:06, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * You're not the first to have asked this question, see here. --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  18:05, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * The Yahoo Answers correspondent suggests that it may refer to a particular firm - is there anything to suggest this elsewhere? It doesn't sound implausible. Tevildo (talk) 21:28, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * This entry in American Women in World War II: An Encyclopedia, under the heading "BOND SALES", does not mention C-H at all, but it does describe some other elements of Deor's first linked poster and it does provide the context in which it was used. It may inspire some more fruitful research.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  22:26, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Cordell Hull? ---Sluzzelin talk  18:45, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Or Capitol Hill? But the posters appear to be addressed to (non-combatant) citizens, rather than to politicians.  Admonishing politicians isn't generally the function of official propaganda, either.  Tevildo (talk) 21:28, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * (e/c) When I first saw the question, my immediate gut impression was that it means "Come on, chaps", which would have sounded quite natural in Britain, although probably not in the USA. But I've found no confirmation that C-H has ever been a recognised abbreviation of that word.  And why wouldn't they have just spelt the word out, if that was intended?  Also, I was intrigued by the stylisation of the comma between "on" and "C-H".  I had to blow the images up to convince myself it really was a comma and not a full stop.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  18:48, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * My first association was "crap handler" or "common housewife", but neither seems plausible.... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:04, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Maybe "Citizen at home/at the home front"? Or "Civilians at home"? But it's a bit contrieved... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:15, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Very interesting question!
 * This database lists quite a few posters with that tag. I don't know if it helps but all the posters I checked were printed in Milwaukee by Mandel Engraving Co. & Art Studios, Inc. Some of the posters talk about "oldtimers" or "forefathers", which would suggest CH=Children as a possibility, but that doesn't fit the theme of some other posters. So still puzzled. Abecedare (talk) 19:21, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Just a wild guess, but could it be a blasphemous emphatic profanity too shocking to be spelt out in full - such as christ in heaven! or christ help us!? --catslash (talk) 19:30, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * I could walk down the road to the Mandel plant, but I doubt there are many people there who were working there during the War. I will check with my local contacts, in case it's a Milwaukee-ism. -- Orange Mike &#124;  Talk  19:41, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Speaking of Milwaukee-ism: Cheese Heads? :) Abecedare (talk) 20:09, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Civilian-helpers?  Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:25, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * That, unfortunately, is a Canadian term, and the posters (particularly the "I Gave A Man" example) are from the USA. Unless the term was used in the USA as well?  Thanks everyone for your help so far. Tevildo (talk) 21:28, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * The first link is American, and while the second is Canadian, given that they are neighbors on the same continent in the same war . . . It's also possible that the writer and the reader, would just interpret C-H as the same concept regardless of the exact C and H words they ascribe to it (ie it did not matter), there seems little doubt, it's directed to nations at war. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:19, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * What a fascinating question! Searching is proving to be quite difficult (I actually clicked a search result to "C-H bonds before realizing my stupidity). Initialisms are more usually separated by periods/stops, so I wonder if the hyphen is a deliberate choice. Rather than two separate words, are we maybe looking for a compound word? Matt Deres (talk) 21:58, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Lots of choices here, but nothing is leaping out at me as plausible. Matt Deres (talk) 22:00, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * After talking to my 88-year-old American mom and doing a little googling, "civilian homefront" is the best we can do. It's a word combination that wasn't uncommon then. The web prefers three words, "civilian home front" by 2-to-1, but there are still over a thousand hits for "civilian homefront". If I were designing the poster, I might choose C-H over C-H-F if I knew the meaning would be clear (especially 70+ years ago, when people were less picky about such things). &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  22:21, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * It sounds plausible. However, if "C-H" were in common use at the time and the poster designers were confident that readers would require no explanation, I'd expect to find some confirmation of that, even after all these years.  But I've found zero relevant hits that link "civilian homefront" with "C H".  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  22:44, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * True, but I guess there are still a few isolated bits of fact from human history that aren't documented on the web. We're working on that. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  22:46, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

At least four posters with this slogan are to be found in the Hoover Institution Political Poster Database at Stanford University. I've emailed one of the people listed as contacts there and will report back if he provides an answer to the question. --174.88.134.249 (talk) 02:49, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

Clearly, the two posters above were created by the same organization and probably the same artists. The writing at the bottom is identical, right down to the barely-visible tail on the comma. Now consider the text of the second poster. Handle tools carefully. Prevent accidents. Avoid spoilage. That's not addressed to the general public, the audience is workers in a factory or something. The posters may have been created by a manufacturing company, for only their factory workers. C-H would refer to the company name, or the factory location. I'm splitting my bet evenly between that and "civilian homefront", while anxiously awaiting results from 174.88.134.249's inquiry. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  10:38, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * On the other hand, this one and this one seem to be addressed to the general public. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:09, 10 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Good point. Back to "civilian homefront". &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  12:12, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Hey 174.88.134.249, if you don't get a good reply soon, try the shotgun approach and email all of the people listed as contacts there. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  13:01, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * If you want to spam them, you do it. Meanwhile, I've had no response. --174.88.134.249 (talk) 17:41, 11 November 2014 (UTC)


 * According to This document the posters above were part of a larger series by the War Production Board. Knowing who made them may help track down what they all mean.  -- Jayron  32  15:51, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

Many years ago, I used some website where you could ask a question of fact. The question was added to a categorized queue. Someone "working there" would then research the question for you. These were people who were familiar with information resources beyond Google searches, although they were advanced Googlers too. If you thought it was a good answer, you could pay them what you felt was a fair price (via PayPal?), IIRC on the order of US$5-10. As a last resort, a good answer to this question would be worth a few of my bucks—if I could remember where that was. Anyone know? &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  22:39, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
 * I remember that, I thought it was called "Ask an Expert" and that it was run by Yahoo, but I'm not sure now. It was like 12 years ago, and I discovered Wikipedia soon after, and it became my primarily outlet for know-it-all-ism instead of the other site. Adam Bishop (talk) 01:01, 11 November 2014 (UTC)


 * I don't recall this one being run by Yahoo, and it definitely wasn't at a Yahoo-branded website. Of course there are places where you can ask questions of the general public, who give free answers that are often worth what you paid for them. No distinction between verifiable fact and personal opinion/perception/belief (or helpful guess). &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  01:33, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

174.88.134.249 - You misuse the word spam, but I'll give it a shot. I have found their contact page, here, which I assume is where you started. Who have you tried to contact? &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  02:22, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

I have also submitted the question to someone in the Military History category at AllExperts.com. It's not strictly military history, but that's as close as you can get there. It said to expect a response within a few minutes to a few days. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  03:06, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Response from AllExperts.com: "I looked into WWII posters for my book Flag: An American Biography, but I was focused on those that used the image of the flag. This is the first I've heard of C-H. I did a bit of searching, but I'm stumped, too! Has anyone contacted anyone at the Smithsonian Museum of American History? They have the most extensive collection of WWII government posters. Someone there might know."

Looking into the Smithsonian route, as well as the possibility of asking others in the Military History category at AllExperts, with the idea that they don't all know the same things. For some weird reason, you can't just submit a question and have everyone in the category see it, you have to choose one person from a list. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  06:01, 14 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks again for all the hard work. This question is about to scroll off the board, so if anyone does find a definitive answer, I'm sure a new posting to inform us what it is would be much apppreciated. Tevildo (talk) 19:12, 14 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Unless someone objects, I'm planning to move the section down to current date tomorrow, to prevent it from being archived. I feel it needs to stay here until it's answered or we give up. I am awaiting replies from the Smithsonian Museum and AllExperts. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  01:50, 15 November 2014 (UTC)


 * All of the posters that have this statement were published in Milwaukee . All of them seem to be of a tone aimed at a locality or factory. Therefore I took the punt of searching for factories in Milwaukee providing services to WWII production. I would suggest that C-H referred to Cutler-Hammer now owned by Eaton Corporation. Nanonic (talk) 13:09, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
 * I think that's the most likely candidate so far. There doesn't seem to be much evidence that "citizen homefront" was abbreviated (and, in any case, one would expect "C.H." rather than "C-H").  It should hopefully be possible for the various resources we've deployed to confirm this. Tevildo (talk) 13:36, 15 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Agreed, that looks pretty good, and Nanonic's punt may have split the uprights and scored three points. My only reservation would be that Google Images "cutler-hammer" war posters doesn't return anything like these posters (although there are a lot of magazine ads, and a few posters that don't look like these). See also Jayron32's comment above. S/he linked a PDF document which states that the posters were produced by the War Production Board. On page 26 is that statement, with an image of one of the C-H posters. So the government would have had to print posters customized for Cutler-Hammer. Is that plausible? I'll go ahead and move this down tomorrow, to buy it another seven days; but I'm prepared to call it a wrap if I haven't heard anything better from my two outstanding inquiries in that time. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss  &#9742;  14:03, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
 * It appears that the posters may have come with a blank spot at the bottom. Compare File:Don't blab. Loose traps help the Japs. Increase production for Axis destruction. - NARA - 535396.jpg with the C-H version. Nanonic (talk) 07:05, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

Why the diagram of vowels is always a trapezoid?
Hi there,

When the Vowels Diagram is always drawn, it is always a trapezoid.

My question is why it is a trapezoid, and not for example, a square.

Thank you! 20:45, 9 November 2014 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Exx8 (talk • contribs)


 * Convenience link: Vowel diagram. Dismas |(talk) 22:25, 9 November 2014 (UTC)


 * The main reason is such diagrams attempt to fit the shape of the mouth, which has more space for subtle vaiations at the top than at the bottom.
 * But not all systems are the same. The V shaped


 * I__________U


 * E____O


 * A


 * System is the most common among individual langauges worlwide. There are plenty of square systems.  The proto-Turkic system is sometimes descibed as cubic, with three dimensions, including roundedness. Proto-Uralic is assumed to have had a column of three front and three back vowels arranged like 6 on a gambling die.  Proto-Eskimo had


 * I_____U


 * ə


 * a


 * But full charts and those not corresponding to any specific language tend to mimic the shape of the oral cavity. μηδείς (talk) 22:32, 9 November 2014 (UTC)