When Did "One Off" Take Off?

[Lombro2]

So "one off instance" existed prior to 1992. Does that really mean anything as far as the source for the phrase in the Diary?

I've looked at a couple of the pre-1992 examples given on Google Books, in context. Both of them refer to quantity. Nothing unique about the instance, nothing aberrant. It's just a one time incident as in one tax added onto another as opposed to 10 added on. So the usage of "one off" had hardly changed in a century, at least in published print.

Why? Is it because people who write journals, and politicians who speak in parliament, are not writing or talking about aberrant things? I think so. They're writing about quantities and speaking about hard facts.

It's the common folk who would use the term "one off" for aberrations and would coin or use a phrase like "one off instance" for an aberrant event rather than a one time event. Good thinking, Michael Barrett! Unfortunately, you could have pulled this one off in 1888 as much a 1992.

[Lombro2]

But he couldn't have coined it himself... I just consulted a friend, same age as me, but in manufacturing and engineering, and he apparently coined the term "one off hamburger/hamburger bun".

He knew the phrase "one off" here in this "foreign" country in the 80s. So yes, it did exist here, just like you said it did in the good old mother country. Now I believe you.

He said "one off" refers to something that doesn't meet, or that exceeds, expectation. He uses it today to refer to bad hamburgers at his favorite fast food place. A "one off hamburger".

I think aberration is again the right word. So using the term for "aberration" seems to be the preferred choice of the people. Off the top of their heads. That makes sense because there's more chance of falling short than exceeding, or of making or doing something bad by mistake than of actually creating something good and unique. Especially a layperson, so to speak.

The emphasis on "unique" has sent other people down some rabbit holes. Without a pocket watch, of course!

[Herlock Sholmes]

So Mike Barrett couldn’t have coined “one off instance but he had to have read it somewhere?

Does a word or phrase not exist unless it’s in published print? Then it’s still an amoeba in 1992.

Google Ngrams turns up none before 1992 and Google Books turns up 21. T gives us a good sample of Mike’s erudite reading.

No, he didn't have to read it somewhere, Lombro. He might have heard it on the radio, TV or in a film. He might have heard it when speaking to friends or family. We don't have a searchable database for these.

And Google ngrams and books isn't everything. I already gave you examples of "one off instance" in newspapers in the 1980s. One-off was a perfectly common expression in England by 1992.

[Lombro2]

So Mike Barrett couldn’t have coined “one off instance but he had to have read it somewhere?

Does a word or phrase not exist unless it’s in published print? Then it’s still an amoeba in 1992.

Google Ngrams turns up none before 1992 and Google Books turns up 21. T gives us a good sample of Mike’s erudite reading.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Here's another misuse or incorrect use IMO of the expression "one off" and this by Bob Azuria in 1995 in his radio interview with Anne Graham.




Might Florence have been a "unique" killer? No. She might have been a killer who killed one. So "one off" has gone back to meaning just a quantity in 1995.

I have just looked at the first three Google Books examples of "a one off" from 1992 and they're all quantities. That's probably because they're all academic journals and "a one off" still means "one" and is mostly used that way. That's probably why "one off instance" only takes off on Google Ngrams after 2000.

That doesn't mean Michael Barrett couldn't have coined it indepedently in 1992. Bob Azuria obviously coined the term back to it's original meaning, in 1995.

Hi Lombro,

Your focus on "unique" as the only meaning of "one off" is taking you down some strange paths.

if you consult any dictionary, the primary meaning of "one-off" is something which happens only once and is unrepeated.

So Bob Azurdia's reference to a "one-off killer" is perfectly correct.

You can also define a one-off instance as an aberrant event. It's essentially the same thing.

But, most importantly, there is absolutely no possibility of Michael Barrett, or anyone else in 1992, coining the expression "one off instance". It was already a common and well used expression in the English language, as I've demonstrated to you, with examples.

I appreciate that you are from a foreign country and that in your country in 1992 this might not have been the case. Here in England, a "one-off instance" already meant something that would not happen again, exactly as the forger used it in the diary.

[Lombro2]

PS Anne Graham doesn't even know the difference between a serial killer and a mass murderer. I would suggest she's thinks a mass murderer is the opposite of a "one-off killer".

It's all about the quantity.

[Lombro2]

Here's another misuse or incorrect use IMO of the expression "one off" and this by Bob Azuria in 1995 in his radio interview with Anne Graham.

BA:…and then suddenly you find that you are possibly the direct descendent of a mass murderer?

AG: Ha ha, no, well actually if it’s what we think it is, or what Paul Feldman’s researchers indicated, it’s Florence that I’m connected with and she was not a mass murderer.

BA: She might have been a one-off killer?

AG: Well she was, I think, an ordinary woman in an extraordinary situation who managed to survive. That sums up Florence I think, erm, perhaps her husband was a mass murderer, I don’t know (laughs).

Might Florence have been a "unique" killer? No. She might have been a killer who killed one. So "one off" has gone back to meaning just a quantity in 1995.

I have just looked at the first three Google Books examples of "a one off" from 1992 and they're all quantities. That's probably because they're all academic journals and "a one off" still means "one" and is mostly used that way. That's probably why "one off instance" only takes off on Google Ngrams after 2000.

That doesn't mean Michael Barrett couldn't have coined it indepedently in 1992. Bob Azuria obviously coined the term back to it's original meaning, in 1995.

[Lombro2]

The ultimate conclusion with regard to one-off is that Michael Barrett could have heard of the expression and added it to his mental vocabulary and was clever enough to coin the phrase "one off instance" if he hadn't run across it before. But I have to admit that the edge goes to James Maybrick for occupational knowledge and creativity. We'll call it a saw.

One off always included the definition of unique. No arguments there. It just didn't exist in the common lexicon to mean unique until the 30s or 40s. Obviously, by or for the laypeople, they picked "one off" and obviously "one off" would be picked by anyone writing personal letters who would use it for a life event rather than a nut or bolt.

I can't fathom why anyone would question that conclusion. If there are any more objections, I'll have to assume that you and/or I are working from the wrong premise and you have nothing else to add to the discussion. And I will dump that premise.

[Herlock Sholmes]

(My emphasis.)

As a matter of interest, Herlock, are you suggesting that Barrett may not have written the scrapbook? If you are, you are seriously bucking the trend on this site. Do you think his infamous January 5, 1995 affidavit may have been untrue?

Hi Ike,

To make the post I intended to make in answer to yours.....

I thought that my comment "if he wrote it" was uncontroversial but just to be clear, I wasn't expressing any view whatsoever as to whether Mike Barrett did or did not write the diary.

I was responding to Lombro's argument, which, astonishingly, he still seems to be persisting with, that Mike Barrett must have been some kind of language genius to coin the expression "one off instance" in 1992 if he wrote the diary.

Which is why I phrased my reply in the way I did. It was a neutral response which didn't suggest anything about Mike Barrett's authorship either way.

[Herlock Sholmes]

My apologies Ike. I tend to write my longer posts on Pages before cutting and pasting. I usually post them in the right thread though.

I’ll re-cut and re-paste.

[Herlock Sholmes]

(My emphasis.)

As a matter of interest, Herlock, are you suggesting that Barrett may not have written the scrapbook? If you are, you are seriously bucking the trend on this site. Do you think his infamous January 5, 1995 affidavit may have been untrue?

You make my point for me in your final paragraph, Ike, when, to explain the significance of the initials as they relate to the authenticity of the diary, you say:

"The Maybrick scrapbook refers to Florence Maybrick's initials being connected with Mary Kelly's wall and - lo! - 'shapes' are there which support that (on Kelly's wall and on her arm)".

That's not an argument to support the authenticity of the diary. If, as you state, the shapes were crystal clear to anyone who cared to look since 1973, the inclusion of the shapes in the diary cannot assist in any way in its authenticity.

It seems to me that you're arguing something very different, namely that the initials show that Maybrick was the killer of Mary Jane Kelly because there is no other explanation for "FM" being on the wall of her room.

You haven't come anywhere near establishing that those initials were actually on the wall, as opposed to perceived shapes in a poor quality photograph, but even if Maybrick was the killer, the diary could still be a fake if the forger saw those initials on the wall in the photograph and incorporated them into the text of the diary.

I think it's really important not to confuse the two things. The forger might have got the right suspect. I don't know. The short point is that if the initials were clearly on the wall in the photograph, they have no bearing on the authenticity of the diary because the forger could have easily seen them at any time after 1973.

To pick up on your other points:

I've never seen the initials overwritten anywhere ever by anyone on an image of the photograph. Could you direct me to where I can find them? If they are so clear and obvious, I'm really surprised that you don't have such an image ready at hand to demonstrate it. All I've ever seen you and anyone else do is reproduce the photograph and claim that the initials are there and all we need to do is look at them. Yet most people respond by saying they're not there and can't see them. So why not just overwrite them? Can I suggest it's because it's impossible to overwrite the supposed "F" in any kind of normal way because it isn't there?

I also think it must be obvious what I meant when I said that this is the only fake Jack the Ripper diary created since 1973. A forger of a diary identifying a particular individual as Jack the Ripper would have a particular interest in examining all the documents and images available in books a certain way, different to anyone else. So what might seem to one person to be random squiggles or shapes can suddenly take on meaning to someone with a forger's imagination. Didn't Martin Fido first think that the initials on the wall were "EM"? So it wasn't even clear to him after he knew what he was looking for.

But just think about it. If in January 1992 a non-fiction writer had published a book claiming that Maybrick was Jack the Ripper and had used the initials "FM" on the wall (and the "F" on the arm) as support of his argument, I doubt he would have been taken very seriously. It would be extremely weak evidence to support his case. It certainly wouldn't be regarded as some kind of miracle that he was the first to see those shapes. Incorporating it into a supposedly genuine diary with an explanation given by Maybrick himself as to why he'd done it, takes it up a level in certain people's imagination. But it's exactly the same thing. Weak.

Finally, your claim that it's "impossible" that the forger might have started the diary and, while writing it, perceived an "M" on the wall and "F" carved into Kelly or even (which I think is less likely) the letters "FM" together on the wall, strikes me as so odd a statement as to be incomprehensible. It's entirely possible. Nothing could be more possible. It is, indeed, one of the most possible things that could ever have happened.

[caz]

There's nothing in Jim's history to tell us that he was capable of murder. There's certainly no evidence for the suggested, but obviously unnamed for obvious reasons, murder in Manchester, either.

Hi Mike,

Obviously nobody could have named a victim in Manchester, whose name never appeared in the papers, for obvious reasons - whether she had existed or was invented to add colour to the diary. Had 'Sir Jim' added any more colour, by naming her Fanny By Gaslight Cradock, would it have helped?

It's on the Maybrick crowd to prove that he commited these crimes, owned the watch and wrote the accompanying novella. I'll wait for that evidence, but I won't hold my breath.

There's a Maybrick crowd now? No wonder they are seen as some kind of threat to the Barrett Hoax believers. Or have they inadvertently given that impression themselves with their strenuous efforts to fight off all of two or three posters?

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Much better, Caz. You have summed it up succinctly.

It brings up 2 points.

• This usage of "one off" really has nothing to do or very very little to do with "unique". It's an "aberrant event" so it's probably the first such usage I know of until that sportswriter this year talking about the aberrant -6 (+/-) in one game for two hockey stars.

• It's aberrant behavior for a serial killer who can usually make it out the front door before he hurts women. Most people wouldn't think it was aberrant behavior for a serial killer.

It's very good profiling.

Most people probably haven't bothered to check the full context, where 'Sir Jim' writes that he was 'so furious' that he hit Florie, who begged him not to do so again. It gave him 'a great deal of pleasure' and if it hadn't been for his 'work', he would have 'cut the bitch up there and then'. But he was 'clever' and did not show his 'hand true'.

In other words he could have seriously lost it, but managed to restrain himself in time and apologise, claiming his behaviour was out of character. He didn't regret his loss of control for Florie's sake, but for his own, because of where it could have led - domestic murder and the hangman.

I dislike the phrase 'it was out of character' as a mitigating factor for someone known to have done something truly evil, because that tends to show it was in their character.

It's fine if it's used to defend someone not yet found guilty of anything, as in: 'It would be out of character for x, y or z to do such a thing.'

Love,

Caz
X

[Iconoclast]

By using the expression "one off instance" in the diary, Mike Barrett, if he wrote it, was doing no more than showing he spoke the English language

(My emphasis.)

As a matter of interest, Herlock, are you suggesting that Barrett may not have written the scrapbook? If you are, you are seriously bucking the trend on this site. Do you think his infamous January 5, 1995 affidavit may have been untrue?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Much better, Caz. You have summed it up succinctly.

It brings up 2 points.

• This usage of "one off" really has nothing to do or very very little to do with "unique". It's an "aberrant event" so it's probably the first such usage I know of until that sportswriter this year talking about the aberrant -6 (+/-) in one game for two hockey stars.

• It's aberrant behavior for a serial killer who can usually make it out the front door before he hurts women. Most people wouldn't think it was aberrant behavior for a serial killer.

It's very good profiling.

But Lombro, isn't any "one off instance" the same as an aberrant event? I mean, hardly anyone ever uses it to be something literally unique. Look at one of the examples I gave you from a 1985 newspaper:

"He does however admit that acts took place. They arose from playful antics within the home and it was certainly a one-off instance. It is not going to happen again."

That was a lawyer speaking in court on behalf of his client, a soldier, who had been found guilty of indecently assaulting his 12 year-old step-daughter. We can see the tautology in that the lawyer felt the the need (like the diary author) to emphasise that the one-off instance wasn't going to happen again. But he wasn't talking about a literally unique event. It was an aberrant event, one supposedly out of character for the soldier, which he wasn't going to repeat.

This was 1985. So I can't fathom why you seem to think that the diary usage was "probably the first such usage" you know of, if that's what you are actually trying to say.