Word: portmanteau
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...portmanteau word, combining snake and shark, invented by Lewis Carroll for the ineluctable prey of his poem, "The Hunting of the Snark." One variety-the Boojum-had the power to make its hunter "softly and suddenly vanish away...
Postgraduate Quiz. Meanwhile, Sponsor Revlon was not deaf to the call of duty. If one quiz show was a smash hit, why not two? The producer, Louis G. Cowan, Inc., came up with a new idea called Panelopoly (a portmanteau word combining panel and monopoly), which would feature a panel of four amateur experts who would answer questions on their specialties. Adman Norman Norman sees Panelopoly as a sort of postgraduate course for contestants who have tried for the top money on The $64,000 Question. Explains Norman: "I got to thinking along this line when I realized that...
Carroll) fostered the fad of the portmanteau word (samples: chortle, combining chuckle and snort; galumph, to gallop triumphantly). But by & large, students have always been the real wordmakers. Sometimes, indeed, their words have become English. Among them: blazer, sophomore and constitutional-originally a bookworm's form of exercise...