re: Ole Miss....why not Ol' Miss????

quote:

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I've never hear anyone honestly claim it is a contraction of "Old Mississippi" or some sort of misspelling.

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I will make that claim. This whole thing started because ONE fricking guy in the 40s made the wild arse assumption that Ole Miss and the supposed slave term were related. It is an answer that is made to fit the question. "Where did Ole Miss get its name?" "I don't know, they're racist, so probably something racist."

"Ole" is a derivation of old or ol', which many people use as a term of endearment; e.g. "Ol' Bob sure is a great guy!"

"Miss" is shorthand for Mississippi. That's it. Add to this the fact that several other schools use Ole of Ol' (USC - "Fight on for Ol' SC," LSU was known as "Ole Lou" or "Old Lou" and "Ole War Skule" for many years during the exact same era as the name Ole Miss developed. LINK )

I have a hard time believing that an Ole Miss co-ed, 30 years after the end of slavery, would have suggested a term used by slaves as the name of the student yearbook of all things.

Anyone who thinks otherwise is a fricking idiot/and or Grinder.