Word: ragtag
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Black Robe's ragtag characters shamble through a fictitious police court. Their problems range from strong-arm felonies to a housewives' quarrel over the basement washing machine. The only professional actor in the shifting cast is the judge. None of the others even try to memorize lines. Instead, they are rehearsed over & over in incidents gathered from court stenographers, judges, police reporters, detectives and the files of the Better Business Bureau. Lord encourages them to act out the basic drama in their own words...
...tough Dominican Exile Miguel Angel Ramirez, who had led his ragtag Legion in the fighting that put Figueres in power just a year before, was bitter: "The ticos [Costa Ricans] have our guns now. They have no need for them now, so they've put them away in a damp cellar to corrode. That's the way they feel about...
...government was planning a spring offensive. The great fear was that "General" Markos Vafiades, the rebel cornmander, would attack first, knocking the government campaign off balance. In Washington, the State Department heard that a ragtag "international brigade" of 30,000 Greeks, French, Italians, Czechoslovaks, Poles, Germans and Spaniards was poised to strike from Albania and Yugoslavia. In Rome, Italian Communists announced formation of a "Greek Liberation Committee" which would send "food, clothing and medicine" to Vafiades...
Booth left the Methodist ministry because the ragtag-&-bobtail following he drew with his fiery street-corner sermons shocked his respectable brethren. Now the Army considers itself a religious body much like any other Protestant denomination, with an accent on works and service. But the old-fashioned blue-and-red uniforms still stand for humility and love-and another chance for sinners...
From then on, Author Duncan's ragtag, bobtail characters resemble Betty MacDonald's farmers, except that his chickens lay golden eggs. In the tinseled, brutal world of prancing ponies and pickpockets, Gus acquires money and mistresses. He sells the pickpocket privilege in the show, trims his partner, boosts his own name into stud-horse type. "When business was high the money rolled in so fast there was no time to sort it, so [it was] shoved into a bushel basket. . . . Gus enjoyed picking up the basket and feasting his gaze on that green currency. Sometimes he plunged...