Letter O for Zero

[cprljohnivey]

I was listening to the 1918 recording of British Art. on another thread and it got me thinking. In 1918 they were saying O (letter O) for Zero when spouting off numbers. My question: How far back does saying O for Zero go?

[riptailedroarer]

Brad, I can't say how far back it goes but it is common practice here in the UK to say the letter "o" for zero.

[JimKindred]

It is common in the US too with the majority of exceptions being those in the miltary and aviation who normally say zero.

"O" is a letter and zero is a number.

[Johnny Lloyd]

My grandfather (86 years old) from Covington, VA still sometimes says "aught" for zero.

I believe that's Appalachian speak... possibly Queen's English.

All the best- Johnny Lloyd

[RJSamp]

4 hours, zero minutes.... 4 o'clock

[LibertyHallVols]

"4 o'clock" is a contraction of "4 of the clock".

The 30 caliber cartridge developed for the US M1903 rifle in 1906 is known as the "30-06", for 30-caliber of 1906. From all I can tell, it has forever been known as the "thirty aught six".

...and this discussion would come to naught if we forgot about "naught"! ;-)

[Hank Trent]

One place that people would be saying this a lot would be when speaking about the year. So was it "eighteen oh nine," "eighteen aught nine," "eighteen zero nine (I doubt it)," or "eighteen hundred and nine"?

A search of the usual databases turns up "eighteen hundred and..." as the most frequent option, and I can't find any examples of "eighteen hundred oh..." (or "o"), but I may have missed some.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[CSchneider]

Recently transcribing the oral history of a couple of elderly Virginians that was done in the early 70s, I noticed that dates were always spoken of as:

"Eighteen and forty two"

or

"Nineteen and aught six"

-Craig Schneider

[Drygoods]

my family still says aught and when you say O they will ask if you mean O-or-0

[cprljohnivey]

Sounds like we should avoid saying "oh" in our time period.