LANGUAGE
"There's a N*gger in the Woodpile Somewhere!"
When I Heard That In The Workplace
Like another expression that I wrote about recently, The Origin Of "I'm Free, White, and 21, you never hear anyone saying, “There's a n*gger in the woodpile” anymore. It made its way into books, television, and film, though it’s been expunged from most available versions. It's been used in a Zane Grey novel, “The Mysterious Rider.” The Hardy Boys' book, “The House On The Cliff,” has one of the teen brothers using the term.
William Faulkner used it, and Agatha Christie put it to use multiple times in her books; it was the title of a chapter in a Hercule Poirot novel. It found a place in several of Erle Stanley Gardner's Perry Mason novels. Even Dr. Suess used it in a children's book.
There was a 1904 film titled "A N*gger in the Woodpile," made eleven years before “The Birth Of a Nation.” W.C. Fields said it, and there was a popular 1930 song with the title. As late as 1971, the British band Supertramp used it in the lyrics of their song "Potter" from their album “Indelibly Stamped.” The common use of the expression ended around the Civil Rights Era; I suspect it had more to do with the Black Power Movement that covered many of the same years.
