Sam Hill ( euphemism ) - wikipedia Sam Hill ( euphemism ) Jump to : navigation , search Sam Hill is an American English slang phrase , a euphemism or minced oath for `` the devil '' or `` hell '' personified ( as in , `` What in the Sam Hill is that ? '' ) . Etymologist Michael Quinion and others date the expression back to the late 1830s ; they and others consider the expression to have been a simple bowdlerization , with , according to the Oxford English Dictionary , an unknown origin . Possible referents ( edit ) Candidate referents for the use date back to at least the 19th century . The following are possibilities of the term 's origin . H.L. Mencken suggested that the phrase derives from Samiel , the name of the Devil in Der Freischütz , an opera by Carl Maria von Weber that was performed in New York City in 1825 . The phrase `` Sam Hill '' can also be seen in the variant `` Samil . '' Sam Hill was a mercantile store owner who offered a vast and diverse inventory of goods . People began using the term `` what in the Sam Hill is that ? '' to describe something they found odd or unusual , just like the inventory found in Sam Hill 's store . The original Sam Hill Mercantile building still stands on Montezuma Street in Prescott , Arizona , and is listed on the register of Historic Places . An article in the New England Magazine in December 1889 entitled `` Two Centuries and a Half in Guilford , Connecticut '' mentioned that , `` Between 1727 and 1752 Mr. Sam . Hill represented Guilford in forty - three out of forty - nine sessions of the Legislature , and when he was gathered to his fathers , his son Nathaniel reigned in his stead '' and a footnote queried whether this might be the source of the `` popular Connecticut adjuration to ' Give ' em Sam Hill ' ? '' The millionaire Samuel Hill , a businessman and `` good roads '' advocate in the Pacific Northwest , became associated with the phrase in the 1920s . A reference appeared in Time magazine when Hill convinced Queen Marie of Romania to travel to rural Washington to dedicate Hill 's Maryhill Museum of Art . The fact that `` Father of Good Roads '' Samuel Hill had n't been born when the figure of speech first appeared in a publication rules out the possibility that he was the original Sam Hill in question . A possible origin for the phrase `` Sam Hill '' is the surveyor Samuel W. Hill ( 1819 -- 1889 ) . Hill allegedly used such foul language that his name became a euphemism for swear words . In the words of Charles Eschbach , `` Back in the 1850s the Keweenaw 's copper mining boom was underway . There were about a dozen men who pretty much ran the Keweenaw . They were mining company agents , the ' go between ' for the investors from Boston and the actual mining production people . Their names were attached to every report sent back to eastern investors . Among these company agents was a man named Samuel W. Hill . Sam was a geologist , surveyor , and mining engineer and had considerable power in the Keweenaw . '' According to author Ellis W. Courter , Samuel Hill `` was an adventurer , explorer , miner , and surveyor . He had worked with Christopher C. Douglas and Douglas Houghton on the early State survey . His judgment was respected . Although he was a rough character , he possessed a big heart and in the fall of 1847 had risked his life to help avert a threatened food shortage in the Copper Harbor district . Generally he was regarded as a hero throughout the entire Copper Country , however , he was contemptuous of all the praise that was heaped upon him . Hill also gained a reputation as being one of the most blasphemous and obscene swearers in the Keweenaw Peninsula . Although he had a colorful vocabulary and told many a good story of his early adventures , his ubiquitous use of lurid cuss words became legendary . Whenever friends or neighbors retold his colorful tales in more polite society , they had to tame his unmentionables by substituting the sinless sounding words ' Sam Hill ' . In time the expression , ' What the Sam Hill ' spread far beyond the Copper Country . Today it has become a part of the American language . Few who utter these words ever heard of Samuel Hill , or know that he was the unconscious originator of a sinless synonym for profanity . '' Another possibility involves the former adjutant general of Kentucky Samuel Ewing Hill , who was sent by the governor of Kentucky to see what was going on in reference to the Hatfields & McCoys family feud in 1887 . Between 1880 and 1891 , the feud claimed more than a dozen members of the two families , becoming headline news around the country , and compelling the governors of both Kentucky and West Virginia to call up their state militias to restore order . The governor of West Virginia once even threatened to have his militia invade Kentucky . Kentucky governor Simon Bolivar Buckner in response sent his adjutant general Sam Hill to Pike County , Kentucky to investigate the situation . Newspapers from around the country awaited word from Hill to find out `` what in the Sam Hill was going on up there '' . References ( edit ) ^ Jump up to : Michael Quinion ( 2004 - 11 - 06 ) . `` World Wide Words : Sam Hill '' . World Wide Words . Retrieved 2007 - 06 - 26 . ^ Jump up to : `` Issue of August 4 , 2001 : On a popsicle stick '' . The Word Detective. 2001 - 04 - 04 . Retrieved 2008 - 11 - 12 . Jump up ^ Various ( 1900 ) . The New Dictionary of American Slang . Jump up ^ Mencken , H.L. ( 1936 ) . The American Language ( 4th ed . ) . Alfred A. Knopf . Jump up ^ `` Hill , Sam , Hardware '' . National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service . Retrieved 11 August 2017 . Jump up ^ TIME Magazine ( 1926 - 08 - 16 ) . `` Sam Hill '' . @ Time Archives . Retrieved 2008 - 09 - 10 . Jump up ^ Words to the Wise : Issue 156 , page 2 from the website of the Institute for Etymological Research and Education Jump up ^ Jill Livingston , 1999 , 2011 . `` Sam Hill Sign '' . Retrieved 2011 - 05 - 19 . CS1 maint : Multiple names : authors list ( link ) Jump up ^ Charles Eshbach . `` What the Sam Hill ? '' . Archived from the original on 2012 - 03 - 24 . Retrieved 2011 - 05 - 19 . Jump up ^ Courter , Ellis W. ( 2005 ) . Michigan 's Copper Country ( PDF ) . Republished by the State of Michigan , Office of Geological Survey . Jump up ^ `` What in Sam Hill ... started the Hatfield and McCoy Feud ? '' . Kentucky.gov . Retrieved 3 June 2012 . Jump up ^ `` The Hatfields and McCoys : The Moran Connection '' . moranfamilytn.blogspot.com . Retrieved 3 June 2012 . Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Hill_(euphemism)&oldid=795068968 '' Categories : Euphemisms Hidden categories : CS1 maint : Multiple names : authors list Talk About Wikipedia Add links This page was last edited on 11 August 2017 , at 20 : 15 . About Wikipedia 
where does what in the sam hill come from
Sam Hill is an American English slang phrase , a euphemism or minced oath for `` the devil '' or `` hell '' personified ( as in , `` What in the Sam Hill is that ? '' ) . Etymologist Michael Quinion and others date the expression back to the late 1830s ; they and others consider the expression to have been a simple bowdlerization , with , according to the Oxford English Dictionary , an unknown origin . Candidate referents for the use date back to at least the 19th century . The following are possibilities of the term 's origin . H.L. Mencken suggested that the phrase derives from Samiel , the name of the Devil in Der Freischütz , an opera by Carl Maria von Weber that was performed in New York City in 1825 . The phrase `` Sam Hill '' can also be seen in the variant `` Samil . '' Sam Hill was a mercantile store owner who offered a vast and diverse inventory of goods . People began using the term `` what in the Sam Hill is that ? '' to describe something they found odd or unusual , just like the inventory found in Sam Hill 's store . The original Sam Hill Mercantile building still stands on Montezuma Street in Prescott , Arizona , and is listed on the register of Historic Places . An article in the New England Magazine in December 1889 entitled `` Two Centuries and a Half in Guilford , Connecticut '' mentioned that , `` Between 1727 and 1752 Mr. Sam . Hill represented Guilford in forty - three out of forty - nine sessions of the Legislature , and when he was gathered to his fathers , his son Nathaniel reigned in his stead '' and a footnote queried whether this might be the source of the `` popular Connecticut adjuration to ' Give ' em Sam Hill ' ? '' The millionaire Samuel Hill , a businessman and `` good roads '' advocate in the Pacific Northwest , became associated with the phrase in the 1920s . A reference appeared in Time magazine when Hill convinced Queen Marie of Romania to travel to rural Washington to dedicate Hill 's Maryhill Museum of Art . The fact that `` Father of Good Roads '' Samuel Hill had n't been born when the figure of speech first appeared in a publication rules out the possibility that he was the original Sam Hill in question . A possible origin for the phrase `` Sam Hill '' is the surveyor Samuel W. Hill ( 1819 -- 1889 ) . Hill allegedly used such foul language that his name became a euphemism for swear words . In the words of Charles Eschbach , `` Back in the 1850s the Keweenaw 's copper mining boom was underway . There were about a dozen men who pretty much ran the Keweenaw . They were mining company agents , the ' go between ' for the investors from Boston and the actual mining production people . Their names were attached to every report sent back to eastern investors . Among these company agents was a man named Samuel W. Hill . Sam was a geologist , surveyor , and mining engineer and had considerable power in the Keweenaw . '' According to author Ellis W. Courter , Samuel Hill `` was an adventurer , explorer , miner , and surveyor . He had worked with Christopher C. Douglas and Douglas Houghton on the early State survey . His judgment was respected . Although he was a rough character , he possessed a big heart and in the fall of 1847 had risked his life to help avert a threatened food shortage in the Copper Harbor district . Generally he was regarded as a hero throughout the entire Copper Country , however , he was contemptuous of all the praise that was heaped upon him . Hill also gained a reputation as being one of the most blasphemous and obscene swearers in the Keweenaw Peninsula . Although he had a colorful vocabulary and told many a good story of his early adventures , his ubiquitous use of lurid cuss words became legendary . Whenever friends or neighbors retold his colorful tales in more polite society , they had to tame his unmentionables by substituting the sinless sounding words ' Sam Hill ' . In time the expression , ' What the Sam Hill ' spread far beyond the Copper Country . Today it has become a part of the American language . Few who utter these words ever heard of Samuel Hill , or know that he was the unconscious originator of a sinless synonym for profanity . '' Another possibility involves the former adjutant general of Kentucky Samuel Ewing Hill , who was sent by the governor of Kentucky to see what was going on in reference to the Hatfields & McCoys family feud in 1887 . Between 1880 and 1891 , the feud claimed more than a dozen members of the two families , becoming headline news around the country , and compelling the governors of both Kentucky and West Virginia to call up their state militias to restore order . The governor of West Virginia once even threatened to have his militia invade Kentucky . Kentucky governor Simon Bolivar Buckner in response sent his adjutant general Sam Hill to Pike County , Kentucky to investigate the situation . Newspapers from around the country awaited word from Hill to find out `` what in the Sam Hill was going on up there '' .
simple bowdlerization