When Did "One Off" Take Off?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Thank you, Caz. I think you and I make for better samples of what constituted common English in 1992.

If someone knew it but learned it working in a foundry or in school, if they studied anything to do with manufacturing or business or even printmaking etc, or was 5 years old in 92 and only learned it "after 2000 when it took off", it doesn't really count. I fortunately spent most of the 80s studying in the public library when it actually had books (five times more than now at least), away from the rarified crowd.

BTW, did your book include a mini-bio for Michael to see what circles he ran in?

Hi Lombro,
,
I don't think you've quite understood what Caz said. She said her late father-in-law regularly used the expression "one off" in normal language from as early as the 1970s. She wasn't saying that she was unaware of it in 1992, as you claim to be.

Your own experience isn't relevant because you tell us you were living in a foreign country at the time. Over here in the UK, I can assure you that "one off" was a very common expression by 1992. I've already proved this for you with actual examples.

I've no idea why you've wrapped "after 2000 when it took off" in quotation marks. This might be true in foreign countries such as the United States but it was well known and well used in England in the 1980s..... but not, of course, the 1880s when it didn't exist at all.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I appreciate your use of 'if' in this context, Herlock. Opinion is divided, but few if any give credence to Mike's initial claim that the diary was all his own work. By the time he accused his estranged wife of doing the handwriting, and jointly composing the text, he had acquired a ruddy great motive for doing so, and there remains zero evidence that she would have collaborated with her husband on writing the diary of "the bogeyman" from her youth.

What this boils down to is that any Tom, Dick or Harriet alive when Mike Barrett was could have known and used the expression, either in writing or conversation, not knowing - nor perhaps caring - if anyone alive in 1888 could have done the same.

It doesn't nail the Barretts.

Love,

Caz
X

Hi Caz,

One minefield is enough for me. I can’t multitask them.

[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.

[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?

[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

[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

[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.

[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?

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.