Entry from
July 12, 2004
Hizzoner
"Hizzoner" is simply "his honor," the mayor of New York City. Or of Chicago, where I found the term earliest. Surprisingly, this term is not in Irving Lewis Allen's City in Slang (1993).
The first citation in the New York Times is September 30, 1921, pg. 22.
12 December 1882, Fort Wayne (IL) Daily Gazette, pg. 6, col. 2:
An old lady from the country was taken in out of the wet, yeesterday afternoon, and with permission of Hizzoner will return home today.
2 July 1883, Decatur (IL) Daily Republican, pg. 1, col. 2:
"Love is a most beautiful and ennobling problem," said Hizzoner, the mayor.
("Long" John Wentworth, the mayor of Chicago -- ed.)
4 August 1885, New York Commerical Advertiser, "Chicago as a Model," pg. 2, col. 3:
"Hizzoner," as the mayor is playfully called by the wild Western papers of his municipality (Carter Harrison of Chicago -- ed.), is attacked from time to time by the effete eastern notion that the "gamblers must go?" The police are "peremptorily ordered" to see that all gambling places are closed, but there has never yet been evidence to show that they were closed much longer than it took the ink to dry on "Hizzoner's" orders.
The first citation in the New York Times is September 30, 1921, pg. 22.
12 December 1882, Fort Wayne (IL) Daily Gazette, pg. 6, col. 2:
An old lady from the country was taken in out of the wet, yeesterday afternoon, and with permission of Hizzoner will return home today.
2 July 1883, Decatur (IL) Daily Republican, pg. 1, col. 2:
"Love is a most beautiful and ennobling problem," said Hizzoner, the mayor.
("Long" John Wentworth, the mayor of Chicago -- ed.)
4 August 1885, New York Commerical Advertiser, "Chicago as a Model," pg. 2, col. 3:
"Hizzoner," as the mayor is playfully called by the wild Western papers of his municipality (Carter Harrison of Chicago -- ed.), is attacked from time to time by the effete eastern notion that the "gamblers must go?" The police are "peremptorily ordered" to see that all gambling places are closed, but there has never yet been evidence to show that they were closed much longer than it took the ink to dry on "Hizzoner's" orders.