🚀 go-pugleaf

J Strobridge (eset08@tattoo.ed.ac.uk) wrote:
: today's puzzle:

: Why on earth is a jukebox called a jukebox - what exactly is a "juke"
: anyway and what connection does/did jukes ever have with black plastic
: discs that played music..... 

It's apparently a corruption of the word dzag or dzug, which was West
African word meaning "to lead a disorderly life".  It got transferred to
the southern US and corrupted to "juke", and the more disreputable and
unsavoury bars became known as "juke joints".  Thus a jukebox was an
automatic gramophone used to entertain customers in juke joints.  The
manufacturers didn't like this as so tended to use "automatic
phonograph" and the like, until Wurlitzer started using the word in
advertising after WWII. 

So there ya go.

(I have to admit cribbing this from the homepage of a vintage
electronics repair shop - see http://www.xmission.com/~chewie/page1.html
- but I'd heard the "juke" bit before somwhere.) 

Here's my problem of the day - what the hell were those insects that
suddenly appeared last night? I've been bitten all over...  for a second
I thought I was back home in the Highlands, but these weren't midges... 

Angus G Rae       Science & Engineering Support Team, Edinburgh University
Email: Angus.Rae@ed.ac.uk     Personal Page: http://www.ed.ac.uk/~angusr/
The above views are mine, and Edinburgh Uni can't have any of them.