Word: deadpan
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...soon found himself treated as a "resident American oracle," expected to answer at the drop of a pencil such questions as "What is the first name of Senator Johnson from Texas?" and "What is a cookie-pusher?" The answer to these came easy, but occasionally he was jolted by deadpan requests to rattle off statistics-like the average number of short tons of zinc which U.S. industry normally had on hand at the end of the month...
...have made a few speeches around the country," Di Salle went on, deadpan, "and been gratified by the crowds which attended. Afterwards I find out they are all looking for jobs." (More laughter.) "I managed to bring quite a few people down here from back home. Matter of fact, it's getting so when you meet someone going down the street, you ask whether he's from Independence or Toledo." (Guffaws.) "Before making my formal talk, I'd like to extend my apologies to you fellows who lost money betting on whether I'd be here...
...good, grey New York Times settled the matter in its own exhaustive way. It tried the burning qualities of both London's and New York's Times, described the tests in a deadpan report. "They were made in three phases: 1) burning rate of a tightly rolled sheet of newsprint, 2) burning rate of a loosely crumpled sheet, and 3) determinations of the advance of a burning edge on a single, unfolded sheet." Found the Times: "In all three comparisons, the London paper's newsprint appeared to burn equally fast, and probably faster than the New York...
...Crimson had used the "Radcliffe Mother" tag before on phony letters, and thought everyone would spot it as an obvious gag. But, said the editors ruefully, they "failed to reckon with the Associated Press." The A.P. gave the letter a deadpan lead ("Awaken ye men of Harvard . . ."), inserted the phrase "purportedly from the mother of a Radcliffe girl," and sent it clicking across the nation...
...Collective Security. Above the intemperate outcry that beat upon the Anglo-American rock rose a steadier voice. London's Economist printed a deadpan parody to remind Britons that the principle of collective security for the free world is the same, East or West. Under the future dateline, "Lake Success, January 22, 1952," the Economist reported another, imaginary "ceasefire debate...