The idiom was popularized in the 1969 book The Godfather and its 1972 movie adaptation, for instance when Sonny says "I 'made my bones' when I was nineteen, the last time the family had a war", and when Moe Greene says "I'm Moe Greene! I made my bones when you were going out with cheerleaders!"[12] The term was also used in The Sopranos several times. As in these examples, in organized-crime usage the phrase refers to establishing one's credibility by killing someone.[2]