Where Did the Term “Shot in the Arm” Come From?
It might not be what you thought.
A Word-Nerd Wonders…
We’ve been waiting for the COVID vaccine, the shot in the arm we all need.
On the day before the much-anticipated, much-needed vaccine arrived in the United States, I began wondering about the phrase “shot in the arm.” When did it originate? How did it come into popular use? (If that seems an odd thing to wonder about, just remember that I am a word-nerd.)
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, the definition of “shot in the arm” is
“something that has a sudden, strong, positive effect on something else providing encouragement and new activity.”
My guess was that the term “shot in the arm” originated in the 1950s with the introduction of the polio vaccine.
If you would guess the same thing, we’d both be wrong.
More Than a Century Before the Polio Vaccine
The term “shot in the arm” started occurring in popular language way before the polio vaccine of 1955. In fact, vaccines had nothing whatsoever to do with this phrase. Intravenous drug use did.
In 1844, a man named Francis Rynd made the first successful injection using a hypodermic needle. Shortly after that, Alexander Wood created an all-glass syringe so that the dosage could be estimated by viewing the level of medication against marks on the glass. At the same time, a French surgeon, Charles Pravaz, modified the make-up of the syringe, manufacturing it entirely of silver.
By the end of the 1800s, the hypodermic syringe had enabled drugs — both medicinal and illicit — to be injected. In 1804, morphine was refined into a salt that could be put into water and injected. The processing of morphine into a water-soluble crystal was the start of a long line of drugs that could also be put into a solution and injected; quinine in 1820, nicotine in 1828, codeine in 1832, and cocaine in 1855, just to name a few.
Commonplace Behavior
By 1900, it was a common practice for people to inject themselves with drugs or vitamins, hoping for that boost of feeling, that “invigorating effect of injecting drugs, either narcotic or medicinal.” In 1904, a statement about the drug use occurred in the San Francisco Chronicle Supplement:
“I varied hardly a minute each day in the time of taking my injection. My first shot was when I awoke in the morning…”
First Traceable Mention in Popular Culture
The Lewistown (Maine) Evening Journal has this quote from January of 1916, implying that the phrase was commonly understood:
“The vets can give politics a shot in the arm, and the political leaders realize it.” —
Today the phrase, “a shot in the arm” is everywhere. It doesn’t matter that the term originated more than a century ago or that it sometimes referred to non-medicinal drug use. This year, it has a positive connotation.
For me, and millions like me, in 2020, the term “shot in the arm,” is the boost of hope that a COVID vaccine brings to a world that desperately needs it.
