Patsy
A victim of deception[edit]
The popularity of the name has waned with the rise of its, chiefly North American,[1] meaning as "dupe" or "scapegoat".[2] Fact, Fancy and Fable, published in 1889, notes that in a sketch performed in Boston 'about twenty years ago' a character would repeatedly ask ‘Who did that?’ and the answer was ‘Patsy Bolivar!’.[3] It may have been popularized by the vaudevillian Billy B. Van, whose 1890s character, Patsy Bolivar, was more often than not an innocent victim of unscrupulous or nefarious characters.[4] Van's character became a broad vaudeville "type," imitated by many comedians including Fred Allen who later wrote, "Patsy Bolivar was a slang name applied to a bumpkin character; later, it was shortened to Patsy, and referred to any person who was the butt of a joke."[5]
Lee Harvey Oswald, after assassinating president John Kennedy, denied he was responsible for the murder, and stated: "No, they are taking me in because of the fact that I lived in the Soviet Union. I'm just a patsy!"[6][7]
Byron Smith, after killing Haile Kifer, and her cousin, Nicholas Brady, in self defense, also claimed he was a patsy.[8]
References[edit]
- ↑ Soanes, Catherine & Stevenson, Angus (ed.) (2005). "Patsy". Oxford Dictionary of English (2nd revised ed.). Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press. p. 1291. ISBN 978-0-19-861057-1.CS1 maint: Uses authors parameter (link)
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedEdgar's Name Pages - ↑ Games, Alex (2010). Balderdash & Piffle. Random House. p. 275. ISBN 9781446415054. Search this book on
- ↑ "Patsy". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 7 August 2016.
- ↑ Bader, Robert S. (2016). Four of the Three Musketeers: The Marx Brothers On Stage. Northwestern University Press. p. 103. Search this book on
- ↑ "Oswald's Ghost". American Experience. PBS. Retrieved 2018-05-13.
- ↑ "A J.F.K. Assassination Glossary: Key Figures and Theories". The New York Times. October 26, 2017. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2018-05-13.
- ↑ "Transcripts". CNN.com. Retrieved 2018-07-15.
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