Someone who attends a court trial as an adviser to one of the parties. This person works not as a legal representative, but as an informal adviser. Also known as a "McKenzie friend". More...
This week's theme: Words not named after the person they should be. Give credit where credit is due, goes the expression, but in this week's words the credit is misplaced. Each of these words is coined after the wrong person. It's not always easy to assign credit, however, as the contention on the naming of diseases shows. There's even a law about misplaced credits. Stigler's law of eponymy says, "No scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer." Stigler credits this law to sociologist Robert K. Merton (thus making the law self-referential).
Back in the day when I sold cars for a living we used to call an "unofficial helper or advisor" a third baseman....we also used to do our best to get them removed from the process so we could get a deal done without their interference. there's also the term for a red herring in a novel or story, called a "McGuffin"
From the Online Etymology Dictionary colloquial for "signature," 1903 (sometimes, through some unexplainable error, John Henry), from the Boston merchant and rebel (1736–1793), signer of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, from his signing that dangerous document first or most flamboyantly. The family name is attested from 1276 in Yorkshire.
Don't quote me on this, but I think it comes from the steel driving John Henry, meaning to "make your mark" or name or X. Isn't John Hancocks signature the largest one on the document, because he wanted the King to be able to read it without his glasses? Jim
I checked a lot of sources and that is the most plausible explanation. According to legend, Hancock signed his name largely and clearly so that King George could read it without his spectacles, but this fanciful story did not appear until many years later. From Snopes.com The delegates to the Continental Congress did not sign the Declaration of Independence the day it was adopted, July 4, 1776, and thus there was no need for Hancock to spur them on by being the first to take that bold step. When Congress adjourned on July 4 after having debated the Declaration for three days and having voted to adopt the document with some revisions, Hancock ; as president of that body; was charged with authenticating the revised document and signing it so that copies could be printed and sent to the colonial legislatures for approval and distributed to the Continental Army. (These copies were not the same as the familiar document that is now on exhibit in the U.S. National archives; the first printed copies of the Declaration bore only the names of John Hancock and Charles Thomson.) Thus, when Hancock first put his name to a copy of the Declaration, he did so in an empty chamber; the only other person present was Charles Thomson, a Pennsylvanian who was serving as the secretary of Congress. It's unlikely Hancock would have spoken any of the defiant phrases attributed to him, as no one was there to hear his words but Thomson. Thomson himself never claimed Hancock said anything about "King George" or "John Bull" as he signed.
And this concludes todays History Lesson! Now lets all get McKenzie to help us with our John Hancock's Be careful not to spill ink all over the place...