Perhaps it’s the mountain fires we’ve had in the Shenandoah Valley recently, but I’ve found myself thinking about something more commonly associated with summer… that incredible wild fruit known as the humble huckleberry. What do mountain fires have to do with huckleberries? Well, ultimately fires help huckleberry crops, of course. Yet, these raging mountain fires we’ve had lately won’t do us any good, really, as it’s moderate underbrush burning that works in favor of an increased huckleberry crop… not raging forest fires.
Nonetheless, with huckleberries on the brain, I thought I’d conduct a little research, and there will be more to follow on this. In the meantime, consider this little tidbit (cited as coming from the Dictionary of American Slang: Second Supplemented Edition (Crowell, 1975), regarding the use of the word huckleberry in the 1800s:
“Huckleberry” was commonly used in the 1800’s in conjunction with “persimmon” as a small unit of measure. “I’m a huckleberry over your persimmon” meant “I’m just a bit better than you.” As a result, “huckleberry” came to denote idiomatically two things. First, it denoted a small unit of measure, a “tad,” as it were, and a person who was a huckleberry could be a small, unimportant person–usually expressed ironically in mock self-depreciation.
Now before everybody starts going all “Tombstone” on me, I’ll let you know, up front, that I’m inclined to believe the phrase “I’ll be your huckleberry” might actually mean “I’ll be your huckle-bearer”… which really translates to “I’ll be your pallbearer”; “huckle” being the handles on coffins. I know, I know… “I’ll be your huckleberry” sounds a lot better. Anyway, for a good “study” on this, consider this post from Rafael’s Blog.
In the meantime, I’ll continue building my “huckleberry post” (which will be more about the significance of the huckleberry in early 19th century America), which might actually appear at around the time when the fruit on those bushes in the blue hills around me is literally ripe for the pickin’.
Cenantua's Blog 
George Pettie
May 14, 2016
I fondly recall feasting on bountiful wild huckleberries during my many hikes over the decades to the summit of Old Rag Mountain, that iconically rugged and rocky centerpiece of the Shenandoah National Park.
Very interesting to learn that “huckleberry” was something of a diminutive or a self-deprecating characterization back in the 19th Century. Are we finding out why that most important progenitor of American literature was titled Huckleberry Finn by one Samuel Clemens, Aka Mark Twain?
mib8
May 16, 2016
Kilmer visited Cordele, GA, the birth-place of Doc Holliday, to work on the local accent. But have no idea what the script-writers and their advisors were thinking. There was a lot of crowd-sourcing being done through that time (1988-2001) by screen-writers and directors and actors, via usenet news-groups and listservs…and probably still is; but I’ve been consciously avoiding them.