Gay American Revolution hero

[boiworship]

Fascinating. I love the description of his retinue arriving at Valley Forge!

http://www.homohistory.com/search?updated-max=2014-05-30T09:45:00-07:00&max-results=7

[MsGuy]

Thanks for the post, Boiworship.

I had read somewhere that Von Steuben might have been gay but didn't know it was so well documented. -And it was interesting to finally find out how a disgraced former officer in Frederick's army wound up training the American army for Washington.

P.S. King Frederick was himself homo. As a teenager, he ran off with his lover, a young officer in the Prussian army. After they were caught, his father forced Frederick to watch his lover being hung.

Frederick remained a bachelor for the rest of his life and, after he died w/o issue, the kingdom was inherited by a collateral branch of the family, all of which served as a just revenge on the hopes of his father.

[Guest CharliePS]

He already knew his lover was hung; he had to watch him being hanged.

[MsGuy]

LOL...Once a school teacher, always a school teacher.

Thanks for making me think of my 8th grade English teacher. She was a real sweet heart and smart as a whip too.

====

Hmmm...On further investigation, while many (but not all) authorities have a clear preference for "hanged" when referring to the execution of a person, this may well be an instance of the creeping Frenchification of past tense and past participle forms of English strong verbs.

Even today kids are telling their parents that they "hanged out with their friends last night." If we don't resist this mindless drift now, no doubt our (figurative) grandchildren will be substituting "runned" for ran. Already we foolishly accept learned for learnt and burned/dived are crowding out burnt/dove.

I call abomination! Let all men of good will rally to the cause of the strong English verb and see off this cursed usage. Let all who dare speak it aloud be hung from the nearest gallows.

http://www.englishrules.com/writing/2005/hanged-or-hung/

[AdamSmith]

Now who just recently called me down a la Cut the English major crap AS!

Which of course is not to take issue with what you said.

[MsGuy]

Ah but I'm not an English major so I'm free to indulge in mindless babble to my heart's content, AS. The applicable rules of posting, though subtle, are quite clear in this regard.

For instance, when I wrote my screed above on behalf of strong verbs, I had no knowledge of what might constitute a strong verb (other than what little I could gather from the context of the term's use in the article I cited). Now that alone makes crafting a post in their defence while concealing my ignorance of the subject matter (w/o coming across a complete idiot) a true high wire act. Frankly I'm rather proud of how well I pulled it off.

And no, don't bother to educate me on the matter. Just now I went and looked it up just to deny you that small pleasure.

[AdamSmith]

To be honest I have not the least recall of what that is.

[RA1]

Perhaps those kids who "hanged out with their friends" were engaging in asphyxiophilia?

Best regards,

RA1

[MsGuy]

To be honest I have not the least recall of what that is.

Near as I can tell, it's just another way of saying regular (weak verbs) and Irregular (strong verbs).

The central conceit is that irregular verbs are so"strong" that they can form their past tense and past participle without the crutch of calling in the "ed" suffix.

[lookin]

A malingering purler named May

Ate a bad Chimichanga Mole.
She both shitted and shat
As she knitted and knat,
And she hopes to be finished some day.

[MsGuy]

He already knew his lover was hung; he had to watch him being hanged.

On the other hand (quoting the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage, 1994):

"The distinction between hanged and hung is not an especially useful one (although a few commentators claim otherwise). It is, however, a simple one and easy to remember. Therein lies its popularity. If you make a point of observing the distinction in your writing you will not thereby become a better writer, but you will spare yourself the annoyance of being corrected for having done something that is not wrong."

[MsGuy]

She both shitted and shat

Now why couldn't I have come up that pairing, lookin, instead of my own feeble dived/ dove exemplar?

Ooo, I'm green with envy.

[AdamSmith]

AND the visual rhyme with cat.

lookin's facility is beyond envy. Were you around, MsGuy, when this thread came about?

http://www.boytoy.com/forums/index.php?/topic/2782-martha-stewart-likes-big-wieners/