The Evolution of the Universally Understood Word ‘OK’
Dr. Erica Brozovsky of the PBS series Otherwords explained the evolution of “OK” and its alliterative form “okay”, noting that this universally understood word has a number of meanings.
The term was used by a newspaper in 1839 to indicate “all correct”, but it became really popular as a slogan for Martin Van Buren‘s contentious re-election campaign. Van Buren was known as Old Kinderhook for his birthplace, which was then shortened to O.K. Sadly for Van Buren, he didn’t get reelected but the word stuck around for good.
OK made its debut in the March 23, 1839 edition of the Boston Morning Post as a shortening for a purposeful misspelling of all correct. But OK didn’t become popular until Martin Van Buren’s 1840 presidential reelection campaign. Van Buren was nicknamed “Old Kinderhook” based on his hometown, and ‘Vote for OK’ became a popular campaign slogan.
