DCHP-1 Online

huckleberry [prob. a variant of hurtleberry]

• 1 n. a shrub of the genus Gaylussacia; also its edible, bluish-black berries.

  • This term is also used to refer to the blueberry, Vaccinium sp., as may, in fact, be the case in some of the following quotations.

  • 1743  (1949)  a Huckle Berrie Mis ke ma na.
  • 1852  (1881)  "We shall have neither huckleberries nor strawberries this summer," she said, mournfully. . . .
  • 1902  The point he chose was where a dense growth of huckleberry and withe-wood ran out to within a few feet of the water's edge, and where the sand of the beach was dotted thickly with tufts of grass.
  • 1958  They . . . lived off the land, utilizing fish . . . salmon berries, silver currants and huckleberries (blue, red, to jet black). . . .
  • 1959  A few huckleberries glimmered frostily blue among the russet leaves.

• 2 n. Slang a trite saying; cliché.

  • 1957  "Things could always be worse" is another of the old huckleberries usually uttered by folk who never had it better.