Carnegie as he appears in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. Andrew Carnegie ( kar- NAY -gee , but commonly KAR -nÉ-ghee or kar- NEG -ee ; November 25, 1835 â August 11, 1919) was a Scottish-American industrialist .
pretentious. adjective. 1  Claiming that or behaving as if one is important or deserving of merit when such is not the case: a pretentious socialite. 2  Showing or betraying an attitude of superiority: made pretentious remarks about his education.
By 1870 the term is reported as being used with a hyphenated adjective, that is, effectively as a single word, with our current 'pretentious; swanky' meaning of the term. The Oxford English Dictionary states that the Pennsylvania newspaper The Titusville Morning Herald used it that way in an advert in October 1870: