[Red Badger]

I always thought that it was because a burning barn would attract a huge crowd................

[Red Badger]

WORD FOR THE DAY PING LIST!.....................

[Ciaphas Cain]

I use "barn burner" sometimes.

I also employ "toad strangler". A bit more obscure but certainly gets the point across.

[God luvs America]

that’s easy- it comes from none other than Keith Jackson....

Whoooooa Nellie!!!!

[BenLurkin]

https://www.lerctr.org/~transit/healy/ballburner.wav

[Harpotoo]

Probably bootleggers tearing a## out of the barn to avoid revenuers:-}

[Alas Babylon!]

The Barnburners were the more radical of the two political groups; the more conservative party was referred to as the Hunkers (possibly on the grounds that they were interested in a hunk of the political spoils, or because they hankered after elective office).

hunker down

phrasal verb

--Hunkered down; hunkering down; hunkers down
1. To lower the body to the ground by bending the legs
2. To stay in a place for a period of time

The meaning of HUNKER is crouch, squat —usually used with down.

[Track9]

I like the idea of burning rats. So that’s good

[frank ballenger]

In the 1970s Gene Shalit on the Today Show reviewed a book about barns and said other than a fire on a ship at sea, a fire in a barn was a source of intense action by a whole town because of how much depended upon the farm community’s barns.
Same with all the people who united together to donate labor for raising a new barn to be built.

[OldHarbor]

Barns ?

Can We Move This 100-Year-Old Barn?

Interesting

[qam1]

Similar note the saying “He Brought the Farm” when someone dies.

During WWII if you died in combat, your family got a $10,000 check, and hence could pay off their mortgage and thus “Buy the Farm”

[Libloather]

Why Are Barns Painted Red?

https://www.farmersalmanac.com/barns-painted-red

[PeterPrinciple]

But before this 20th century use, barn burner had a very specific meaning in US politics. The Barnburners were one of two competing factions in the New York State Democratic Party in the middle of the 19th century. John Russell Bartlett, in his 1848 Dictionary of Americanisms, provided a lengthy quote from the New York Tribune, which explained that the name was “in allusion to the story of an old Dutchman who relieved himself of rats by burning his barns which they infested.” In this case, the Barnburners were so determined to get rid of systemic abuses that they were willing to destroy the system itself.

---

the Barnburners were so determined to get rid of systemic abuses that they were willing to destroy the system itself.

the point of the article. what is the application?

[citizen]

Barn burner, like gangbusters, a colloquialism of those times.

“Going like ‘Gang Busters’” (1936-1957) derived from a popular, noisy police radio play of the day.

[fso301]

I always thought that it was because a burning barn would attract a huge crowd................

Dramatic flames, noisy animals, people trying to release trapped animals, escaping animals, lots of people running about hollering, screaming and crying. A high emotion event.

[Dr. Franklin]

Wow! Now, “yclept” is a word you don’t read every day. Curious that the phrase “barn burner” originated in Pennsylvania. It’s difficult to believe anyone that anyone would waste all of the wood from his barn due to a rat problem. Certainly, the Scottish would never do that.

[Varsity Flight]

“A long hot summer, seems to know every time your near”

[Flash Bazbeaux]

I think your Word of the Day is eclipsed by “yclept.”

From your post: “as the Radicals are yclept in our State. —New York Tribune, 20 January 1842”?

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/yclept

yclept

to say, speak, utter; to call, shout; to name; to address; to appeal to, beg, pray; to ask, request; to appear; to send for, summon; to convene; to call forth, induce; to lay claim

[ChronicMA]

Aren’t the Amish famous for their one day barn-burner events put on by the whole community?

[central_va]

An old barn full of manure and straw burns up spectacularly.

[Sirius Lee]

I always thought it referred to an old fashioned country hoedown when suddenly trouble showed up at the barn doors.