![]() And oxen may have come from an intermediate form out's in free - other recorded versions are awk in, Oxford, and ocean. Oral transmission has garbled this in fascinating ways, with all in, for example, being translated by a series of mishearings to the name Ollie (short for Oliver, once more common than it is now). One guess is that the original was something like "all in free" for "all who are out can come in free", to indicate that the person who is "it" in the game of hide-and-seek has caught somebody to become the new "it", and so everybody else can come out of hiding without the risk of being caught. For the out(s) in phrase, we also see ocean, oxford, ax in, awk in, and even oops all in.Ģ. Norwegian settlement areas have Ole Ole Olsen's free. The most common of these has oxen replacing out(s) in, giving all-ee all-ee oxen free with the all-ee reinterpreted as the name Ollie, we arrive at your phrase, which, according to the Dictionary of American Regional English, is especially common in California. These phrases got modified to all-ee all-ee (all) in free or all-ee all-ee out(s) in free the -ee is added, and the all is repeated, for audibility and rhythm.įrom here the number of variants takes off, and we start seeing folk etymologies in various forms. The original form of the phrase was something like all in free or all's out come in free, both standing for something like all who are out can come in free. When "it" finds the first hider, he calls out some phrase indicating that the other players are "safe" to return "home," at which point the person "it" found will succeed him as "it." ![]() The rough form of this game is that a player (called "it") gives other players a chance to hide, and then tries to find them. The phrase is used in a variety of children's chasing games, especially hide-and-(go-)seek. Lots and lots of theories from lots and lots of sites. It was shouted at the end of a kids' hide and seek game, and probably started around the turn of the 20th Century, because of its mix of German/English, etc. David from Denver, CoOllie Ollie In Come Free - has nothing to do with politics, income, Oliver North, etc., though you can read politics into anything I suppose.I'm fairly certain it was already known as "Drive" at that time because they gave us hats that said "Drive- R.E.M. It was filmed on an August night in 1992 at the Sepulveda Dam in L.A. Elissa from Manhattan Beach, CaI was actually in this video.Adam from Boyce, VaDefinetly an eerie and haunting song.I didn't even know what HERD POLITICS meant until Stipe used it, then he is guilty of blatantly personafying the word. Everyone I knew at the show from Athens was astonished. During that concert, Stipe lashed out at U2 singer and humanitarian, Bono, accusing him of HERD ying to herd the masses into your political way of thinking and voting. Less than a week before Stipe took out this full page ad in the Wall Street Journal, NY Times, USA Today, Atlanta Journal & Constitution, and Athens newspaper, actually the day before Thanksgiving, right before that election, Michael Stipe and REM performed at the Fabulous FOX Theater in Atlanta. ![]()
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