Word: thwacking
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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Navy Program. "It was a slap in the face for President Coolidge," said Representative McClintic of Oklahoma, Democrat. It was also another thwack for Secretary of the Navy Wilbur, when the House Naval Affairs Committee voted last week, 15 to 1, to rewrite the Administration's Navy building program. The Committee did not wish to change the volume of the program. It only meant to make sure that the ships authorized (25 light cruisers, nine destroyer leaders, 32 submarines, five aircraft carriers) shall be laid down in five years and completed in eight years. Toward this end, the Committee...
...TIME [Oct. 10] I am desecrated to read of an "octogenarian thwack." What is a thwack if it is not a "fancy spelling" of whack...
...Thwack v. Whack...
...words can be perfect synonyms. A "whack" is a blow delivered much in the same way as a "thwack," but it presupposes a certain capable nonchalance in the deliverer. A thwack is a blow delivered more clumsily, though with equal vigor, by some person not accustomed to administering physical violences; as a timid schoolboy, an enraged English butler, any octogenarian...
...vicinity of the London Stock Exchange, prowled a pickpocket. Soon he espied an old gentleman, walking solo. "Easy money," he grinned and sidled up behind. Then, drawing up abreast, his nimble fingers felt for the oldster's watch. Instanter a bony fist hit him a resounding thwack on the jaw and he went reeling into the roadway...