Japanese

  04:38

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J01

Words and Their Stories -- a program in Special English. Every word has its own story. Today's word is "maverick." Where did it come from? What does it mean? How did it get into the language?

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One hundred and twenty-eight years ago, the huge southwestern territory called Texas became the 28th state of the Union. Texas was open-range prairie land with rich soil, long-horn steers, ranches, and cowboys. Early in the 1800's, a man named Samuel Augustus Maverick moved to Texas from the East. Mr. Maverick, fresh from law school, settled down to become a leading statesman and landowner. He became a fighter for Texan independence from Mexico, and finally the Mayor of San Antonio.

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J03

As the years passed, Samuel Maverick added to his landholdings in Texas. Before long, he owned vast cattle lands, but he had no cattle. He was not a rancher. One day, however, in the year 1845, a man came to Mr. Maverick to pay him an old debt, but instead of paying him with money he offered 400 head of cattle. Mr. Maverick took them even though he did not want to. He turned the cattle loose on his land to graze and care for themselves and to forget them. As time passed, the cows had calves, and these grew and also had calves. The herd doubled and doubled again. In time, hundreds of cows and calves roamed freely, even across the land of nearby ranch owners.

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It was a tradition among ranch owners in the West to brand their newborn calves with a mark of ownership. They burned the name of their ranch into the flesh of an animal with a hot iron. This made a clear mark or brand. Each cattle owner, therefore, knew his own calves from those of the others. Sam Maverick, however, refused to brand his calves. Why should he? If all the other cattle owners branded theirs, then those without a brand belonged to him. Sam Maverick. And this is how the word "maverick," got into the language. It meant a calf without a brand. As time passed, however, the word, "maverick," took on a broader meaning. It came to mean a person who was too independent to follow his group. So, Sam Maverick became a maverick in more than name, refusing to brand his cattle as the other ranch owners did.

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J05

Sam's grandson also was a maverick. He was Maury Maverick who became a congressman in Washington in 1935. The young Maverick was a Democrat, but he was also an independent thinker. While in Washington, he refused to follow his party, and he led a group of progressive Democrats who also disagreed with the party leaders. This group was called the Mavericks because they refused to wear the Democratic brand.

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J06

And so, this is the story of how a man's name became part of the American language. A story that began more than 100 years ago, when a cowboy found one of Sam Maverick's lost calves and called it a "maverick."

Voice of America

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