Sunday Herald (Sydney, NSW : 1949 - 1953), Sunday 25 February 1951, page 6
"Lifer's" Book On Prison Slang
TEN YEARS' WORK BY "THIRTY-FIVE"
By SIDNEY J. BAKER
Author of "The Australian Language," etc.
A LIFE-SENTENCE prisoner in a New South Wales Gaol is now putting the finishing touches to a dictionary of Australian underworld slang which promises to be the most outstanding study of its kind yet produced in this country.
WHEN this dictionaryis completed, a copy of it will go into the archives of the Mitchell Library, Sydney, bearing the simple title, "The Argot."
The author's name and identity will be hidden behind the by-line, "Thirty-five."
"Thirty-five" is one of those rare, well-educated persons who, after long years of respectable citizenship and useful service to their fellows, are caught up in a violent and un-predictable emotional storm and find themselves on the receiving end of a capital charge.
He has now been in prison more than 10 years.
With the generous encouragement of the N.S.W. Prisons Department, he has devoted a good deal of that time to recording the jargon used by his fellow Gaol birds.
THE result is the best piece of amateur lexicography I have encountered in Australia. Its value rests not only on the patience and painstaking care that "Thirty-five" has devoted to his task, but to his awareness that you can't do fieldwork in language without being introduced to some interesting aspects of sociology.
You get a glimpse of what is involved when you inspect the definition "Thirty-five" has given to prison use of the ex-pression "buy up."
This, he says, is the amount a prisoner may spend on groceries from his weekly earnings, and also what he purchases.
He adds: "Prisoners who have served a specified term may spend up to a fixed amount from bonus earnings on butter, jam, cheese, etc. The scale is: One year's servitude, 2/6; over three years, 3/; over five years, 4/; over seven years, 5/."
Use Of "Head"
YOU learn more of what goes on inside our Gaols when you look at what he has to say about the slang use of "head."
Darlinghurt Prison
A "head," he says, is a high prison official or a privileged prisoner.
He adds: "Few heads are short timers. To become and to remain a head, a prisoner is always:
(a) 'institutionalised' either in Gaol or before he arrives (e.g., in the Services);
(b) a tradesman or professional man whose skill makes him useful to the administration;
(c) sufficiently discreet to keep off others' toes.
Heads are usually long timers, I suspect, because murder is not an occupation, whereas theft often is.
"Occasionally, a sedate citizen runs off the rails to commit a serious or even capital crime, but to commit a petty theft, never."
Maitland Gaol
Imposing List
WHAT are the names given to other prison occupants?
"Thirty-five" presents an imposing list.
Among those present are: "brat," a seventh-class prisoner
i.e., one under 24-26 years; "kangaroo,"
a warder, by rhyme on the word "screw," which is used similarly;
"lug-ger," a shameless beggar; "pie-eater" or "pie-cruncher," a small-time crook;
"teddy bear," a flashily dressed, exhibitionistic person, by rhyme on "lair";
"toe-ragger," a short sentence prisoner; "short story writer," a forger;
warb," a dirty or untidy person;
"wife-starver," a prisoner confined under the provisions of the Deserted Wives and Children Act.
Then there is the "Rhodes scholar," about whom "Thirty-five" notes:
"This is an expression of derision addressed to a prisoner who thinks he is above the common herd; how-ever, it is not always derisive, as it may be used to express gratitude for a favour done— 'Good on you, sport; you're a Rhodes scholar!' "
IT is impossible within the limitations of the space here to do adequate justice to the entertaining richness of "Thirty-five's" study.
Here, however, are a few of the terms he records in use among our Gaol birds: "bridge," a plausible tale or excuse; "buckle," to arrest; "the bull ring," the old punishment section at Parramatta Gaol; "cold," not guilty of an offence; "do the crust," to be convicted as a vagrant; "full quid," in full possession of one's faculties; "giggle suit," prison garb; "hominy gazette," gaol rumour; "keyman," a habitual criminal; "lounge," the dock in court; "reef," to take; "roast," a calumny, an il lreport; "slime," flattery; "track," a warder who will carry contraband messages or goods out of or into Gaol for a prisoner.
On the use of tobacco as a medium for barter in prison, "Thirty-five" offers some interesting observations.
He says: "Half a pound of butter is worth a 'swy' (2 oz. of tobacco); a tube of tooth-paste or shaving cream, about the same; a tin of syrup or plum jam, one ounce; more expensive jam, two ounces.
In Gaol, every service, favour, and commodity is as readily reducible to price in tobacco as it is to money in civil life."
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