cornfield meet

== English == === Etymology === Either from the fact that early train collisions often occurred out in the country alongside a cornfield rather than in a station or siding; or from staged events where two old steam locomotives were purposely run head on at each other, often in an open field, for public entertainment. In the latter idea, the term may jocularly echo field meet as a spectacle in the field involving opposing contestants. === Pronunciation === (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈkɔːnfiːld ˌmiːt/ (General American) IPA(key): /ˈkɔɹnˌfild ˌmit/ Hyphenation: corn‧field meet === Noun === cornfield meet (plural cornfield meets) (US, rail transport, euphemistic) An accidental head-on collision or near head-on collision of two trains. [from 19th c.] ==== Synonyms ==== (collision): prairie meet (hobo slang) (near-collision): Mexican standoff ==== Translations ==== ==== See also ==== train wreck === References === Robert L[undquist] Chapman, editor (1986), New Dictionary of American Slang, 3rd edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Row, →ISBN, page 83. Terry L. McIntyre (winter 1969), “The Language of Railroading”, in American Speech, volume 44, number 4, →JSTOR, pages 243–262. Eric Partridge (1931), G[odfrey] Irwin, editor, American Tramp and Underworld Slang [...] With a Number of Tramp Songs. Edited with Essays [...] by G. Irwin. With a Terminal Essay on American Slang in its Relation to English Thieves’ Slang by Eric Partridge, London: Eric Partridge, →OCLC. === Further reading === head-on collision on Wikipedia.Wikipedia