When
someone was especially rambunctious or trouble-making or outlandish in any way,
my Texas-raised mother would call that person a “ring-tailed tooter.” I don’t
encounter that phrase much any more, but it certainly serves a purpose when
needed. It can be used to describe mischievous children, especially the kind
who leave a trail of wreckage behind them. But there’s also a hint of
admiration (and maybe envy) in the epithet, giving credit to someone with a
zesty approach to life. Perhaps the quintessential ring-tailed tooter would
have been Huckleberry Finn, although I don’t believe Mark Twain ever referred
to him as such.
The
etymology is uncertain, the “ring-tailed” part seemingly referring to the
pattern on the tail a raccoon, an animal noted for mischief, and the “tooter”
perhaps alluding to someone blowing a horn, or maybe on a “toot” (that is, a
spree or drinking binge).
The
first recorded use of the term was applied not to a person, but an event. It’s
a description of a parade in The
Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier, a 1910 novel by Edgar Beecher Bronson:
While
the Cross Cañonites were liquoring
at the Fashion Bar (Circuit drinking
sarsaparilla), Lame Johny, the barkeeper, remarked: "You-uns missed
it a lot, not seein' the pr'cesh. She were a ring-tailed tooter for fair, with
the damnedest biggest noise-makin' band you ever heard, an' th' p'rformers
wearin' more pr'tys than I ever allowed was made."
The
Bard of Buffalo Bayou is known in some quarters as “The Ring-Tailed Tooter of
Poesy,” a title he lives up to with every stroke of his pen.
When
Henry VIII became loud and rambunctious,
Cardinal
Wolsey’s response was always quite unctuous.
The
more Wolsey “tsked,” the more Henry was boisterous,
And
if Wolsey rebuked him, then Henry grew roisterous.
No
monarch had ever been cruder or ruder,
Which
is why they called Henry a Ring-Tailed Tudor.
I was born & raised in Texas & so were generations of family before me. When we were kids, our Papaw would call us 'Ring-tailed tooters with the tooter popped off'
ReplyDeleteMy Daddy always referred to raccoons as Ring tailed tooters. I grew up in North Alabama, on the Tennessee line.
ReplyDeleteI lived in NE Arkansas. When I was especially busy, my mom would say I was busier than a “RingTailed Tooter.”
ReplyDeleteI grew up in southern Indiana right on the Ohio River. My brother was always getting into everything,touching everything.My grandma would say “leave that alone you ring-tailed-tooler.not tooter so the saying or some form of it travels north of the Mason-Dixon Line
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